THE  LITTLE  LADY  OF 
THE  BIG   HOUSE 


BY 

JACK  LONDON 

Author  of  "The  Valley  of  the  Moon,"  "The  Star 
Rover,"  "The  Sea  Wolf,"  Etc. 


fork 
THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 


All  rights  reserved 


Copyright,  1915 
By  JACK  LONDON 


Copyright,  1916 

By  JACK  LONDON 

Set  up  and  electrotyped.     Published  April,  1916 


Copyrighted  in  Great  Britain 


P 

£ 


/f/W/J 


THE  LITTLE  LADY  OF  THE 
BIG  HOUSE 


333809 


THE  LITTLE  LADY  OF  THE 
BIG  HOUSE 

CHAPTER  I 

HE  awoke  in  the  dark.  His  awakening  was 
simple,  easy,  without  movement  save  for 
the  eyes  that  opened  and  made  him  aware 
of  darkness.  Unlike  most,  who  must  feel  and  grope 
and  listen  to,  and  contact  with,  the  world  about  them, 
he  knew  himself  on  the  moment  of  awakening,  in 
stantly  identifying  himself  in  time  and  place  and  per 
sonality.  After  the  lapsed  hours  of  sleep  he  took 
up,  without  effort,  the  interrupted  tale  of  his  days. 
He  knew  himself  to  be  Dick  Forrest,  the  master  of 
broad  acres,  who  had  fallen  asleep  hours  before 
after  drowsily  putting  a  match  between  the  pages  of 
"  Road  Town  "  and  pressing  off  the  electric  reading 
lamp. 

Near  at  hand  there  was  the  ripple  and  gurgle  of 
some  sleepy  fountain.  From  far  off,  so  faint  and 
far  that  only  a  keen  ear  could  catch,  he  heard  a 
sound  that  made  him  smile  with  pleasure.  He  knew 
it  for  the  distant,  throaty  bawl  of  King  Polo  —  King 
Polo,  his  champion  Short  Horn  bull,  thrice  Grand 
Champion  also  of  all  bulls  at  Sacramento  at  the  Cali 
fornia  State  Fairs.  The  smile  was  slow  in  easing 


2  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

from  Dick  Forrest's  face,  for  he  dwelt  a  moment  on 
the  new  triumphs  he  had  destined  that  year  for  King 
Polo  on  the  Eastern  livestock  circuits.  He  would 
show  them  that  a  bull,  California  born  and  finished, 
could  compete  with  the  cream  of  bulls  corn-fed  in 
Iowa  or  imported  overseas  from  the  immemorial 
home  of  Short  Horns. 

Not  until  the  smile  faded,  which  was  a  matter  of 
seconds,  did  he  reach  out  in  the  dark  and  press  the 
first  of  a  row  of  buttons.  There  were  three  rows  of 
such  buttons.  The  concealed  lighting  that  spilled 
from  the  huge  bowl  under  the  ceiling  revealed  a 
sleeping-porch,  three  sides  of  which  were  fine-meshed 
copper  screen.  The  fourth  side  was  the  house  wall, 
solid  concrete,  through  which  French  windows  gave 
access. 

He  pressed  the  second  button  in  the  row  and  the 
bright  light  concentered  at  a  particular  place  on  the 
concrete  wall,  illuminating,  in  a  row,  a  clock,  a 
barometer,  and  centigrade  and  Fahrenheit  thermom 
eters.  Almost  in  a  sweep  of  glance  he  read  the  mes 
sages  of  the  dials:  time  4:30;  air  pressure,  29:80, 
which  was  normal  at  that  altitude  and  season;  and 
temperature,  Fahrenheit,  36°.  With  another  press, 
the  gauges  of  time  and  heat  and  air  were  sent  back 
into  the  darkness. 

A  third  button  turned  on  his  reading  lamp,  so 
arranged  that  the  light  fell  from  above  and  behind 
without  shining  into  his  eyes.  The  first  button 
turned  off  the  concealed  lighting  overhead.  He 
reached  a  mass  of  proofsheets  from  the  reading 
stand,  and,  pencil  in  hand,  lighting  a  cigarette,  he 
began  to  correct. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  3 

The  place  was  clearly  the  sleeping  quarters  of  a 
man  who  worked.  Efficiency  was  its  key  note, 
though  comfort,  not  altogether  Spartan,  was  also 
manifest.  The  bed  was  of  gray  enameled  iron  to 
tone  with  the  concrete  wall.  Across  the  foot  of  the 
bed,  an  extra  coverlet,  hung  a  gray  robe  of  wolfskins 
with  every  tail  a-dangle.  On  the  floor,  where  rested 
a  pair  of  slippers,  was  spread  a  thick-coated  skin  of 
mountain  goat. 

Heaped  orderly  with  books,  magazines  and  scrib 
ble-pads,  there  was  room  on  the  big  reading  stand 
for  matches,  cigarettes,  an  ash-tray,  and  a  thermos 
bottle.  A  phonograph,  for  purposes  of  dictation, 
stood  on  a  hinged  and  swinging  bracket.  On  the 
wall,  under  the  barometer  and  thermometers,  from 
a  round  wooden  frame  laughed  the  face  of  a  girl. 
On  the  wall,  between  the  rows  of  buttons  and  a 
switchboard,  from  an  open  holster,  loosely  projected 
the  butt  of  a  .44  Colt's  automatic. 

At  six  o'clock,  sharp,  after  gray  light  had  begun 
to  filter  through  the  wire  netting,  Dick  Forrest,  with 
out  raising  his  eyes  from  the  proofsheets,  reached 
out  his  right  hand  and  pressed  a  button  in  the  second 
row.  Five  minutes  later  a  soft-slippered  Chinese 
emerged  on  the  sleeping-porch.  In  his  hands  he  bore 
a  small  tray  of  burnished  copper  on  which  rested  a 
cup  and  saucer,  a  tiny  coffee  pot  of  silver,  and  a  cor 
respondingly  tiny  silver  cream  pitcher. 

u  Good  morning,  Oh  My,"  was  Dick  Forrest's 
greeting,  and  his  eyes  smiled  and  his  lips  smiled  as  he 
uttered  it. 

"  Good  morning,  Master,"  Oh  My  returned,  as 
he  busied  himself  with  making  room  on  the  reading 


4  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

stand  for  the  tray  and  with  pouring  the  coffee  and 
cream. 

This  done,  without  waiting  further  orders,  noting 
that  his  master  was  already  sipping  coffee  with  one 
land  while  he  made  a  correction  on  the  proof  with 

ie  other,  Oh  My  picked  up  a  rosy,  filmy,  lacy  bou- 
from  the  floor  and  departed.  His  exit  was 
lioiseless.  He  ebbed  away  like  a  shadow  through 
the  open  French  windows. 

At  six-thirty,  sharp  to  the  minute,  he  was  back  with 
a  larger  tray.  Dick  Forrest  put  away  the  proofs, 
reached  for  a  book  entitled  "  Commercial  Breeding 
of  Frogs,"  and  prepared  to  eat.  The  breakfast  was 
simple  yet  fairly  substantial  —  more  coffee,  a  half 
grape-fruit,  two  soft-boiled  eggs  made  ready  in  a  glass 
with  a  dab  of  butter  and  piping  hot,  and  a  sliver  of 
bacon,  not  over-cooked,  that  he  knew  was  of  his  own 
raising  and  curing. 

By  this  time  the  sunshine  was  pouring  in  through 
the  screening  and  across  the  bed.  On  the  outside  of 
the  wire  screen  clung  a  number  of  house-flies,  early- 
hatched  for  the  season  and  numb  with  the  night's 
cold.  As  Forrest  ate  he  watched  the  hunting  of  the 
meat-eating  yellow-jackets.  Sturdy,  more  frost-re 
sistant  than  bees,  they  were  already  on  the  wing  and 
preying  on  the  benumbed  flies.  Despite  the  rowdy 
noise  of  their  flight,  these  yellow  hunters  of  the  air, 
with  rarely  ever  a  miss,  pounced  on  their  helpless 
victims  and  sailed  away  with  them.  The  last  fly  was 
gone  ere  Forrest  had  sipped  his  last  sip  of  coffee, 
marked  "  Commercial  Breeding  of  Frogs  "  with  a 
match,  and  taken  up  his  proofsheets. 

After  a  time,  the  liquid-mellow  cry  of  the  meadow- 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  5 

lark,  first  vocal  for  the  day,  caused  him  to  desist. 
He  looked  at  the  clock.  It  marked  seven.  He  set 
aside  the  proofs  and  began  a  series  of  conversations 
by  means  of  the  switchboard,  which  he  manipulated 
with  a  practiced  hand. 

"  Hello,  Oh  Joy,"  was  his  first  talk.  "  Is  Mr. 
Thayer  up?  .  .  .  Very  well.  Don't  disturb  him. 
I  don't  think  he'll  breakfast  in  bed,  but  find  out.  .  .  . 
That's  right,  and  show  him  how  to  work  the  hot 
water.  Maybe  he  doesn't  know  .  .  .  Yes,  that's 
right.  Plan  for  one  more  boy  as  soon  as  you  can 
get  him.  There's  always  a  crowd  when  the  good 
weather  comes  on.  .  .  .  Sure.  Use  your  judgment. 
Good-by." 

"  Mr.  Hanley?  .  .  .  Yes,"  was  his  second  con 
versation,  over  another  switch.  "  I've  been  thinking 
about  the  dam  on  the  Buckeye.  I  want  the  figures 
on  the  gravel-haul  and  on  the  rock-crushing.  .  .  . 
Yes,  that's  it.  I  imagine  that  the  gravel-haul  will 
cost  anywhere  between  six  and  ten  cents  a  yard  more 
than  the  crushed  rock.  That  last  pitch  of  hill  is 
what  eats  up  the  gravel-teams.  •  Work  out  the  fig 
ures.  .  .  .  No,  we  won't  be  able  to  start  for  a  fort 
night.  .  .  .  Yes,  yes;  the  new  tractors,  if  they  ever 
deliver,  will  release  the  horses  from  the  plowing,  but 
they'll  have  to  go  back  for  the  checking.  .  .  .  No, 
you'll  have  to  see  Mr.  Everan  about  that.  Good- 

by." 

And  his  third  call : 

"  Mr.  Dawson?  Ha!  Ha!  Thirty-six  on  my 
porch  right  now.  It  must  be  white  with  frost  down 
on  the  levels.  But  it's  most  likely  the  last  this 
year.  .  .  .  Yes,  they  swore  the  tractors  would  be  de- 


6  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

livered  two  days  ago.  .  .  .  Call  up  the  station  agent. 
...  By  the  way,  you  catch  Hanley  for  me.  I  for 
got  to  tell  him  to  start  the  *  rat-catchers  '  out  with 
the  second  instalment  of  fly-traps.  .  .  .  Yes,  pronto. 
There  were  a  couple  of  dozen  roosting  on  my  screen 
this  morning.  .  .  .  Yes.  .  .  .  Good-by." 

At  this  stage,  Forrest  slid  out  of  bed  in  his  pa 
jamas,  slipped  his  feet  into  the  slippers,  and  strode 
through  the  French  windows  to  the  bath,  already 
drawn  by  Oh  My.  A  dozen  minutes  afterward, 
shaved  as  well,  he  was  back  in  bed,  reading  his  frog 
book  while  Oh  My,  punctual  to  the  minute,  massaged 
his  legs. 

They  were  the  well-formed  legs  of  a  well-built, 
five-foot-ten  man  who  weighed  a  hundred  and  eighty 
pounds.  Further,  they  told  a  tale  of  the  man.  The 
left  thigh  was  marred  by  a  scar  ten  inches  in  length. 
Across  the  left  ankle,  from  instep  to  heel,  were  scat 
tered  half  a  dozen  scars  the  size  of  half-dollars. 
When  Oh  My  prodded  and  pulled  the  left  knee  a 
shade  too  severely,  Forrest  was  guilty  of  a  wince. 
The  right  shin  was  colored  with  several  dark  scars, 
while  a  big  scar,  just  under  the  knee,  was  a  positive 
dent  in  the  bone.  Midway  between  knee  and  groin 
was  the  mark  of  an  ancient  three-inch  gash,  curiously 
dotted  with  the  minute  scars  of  stitches. 

A  sudden,  joyous  nicker  from  without  put  the 
match  between  the  pages  of  the  frog  book,  and,  while 
Oh  My  proceeded  partly  to  dress  his  master  in  bed, 
including  socks  and  shoes,  the  master,  twisting  partly 
on  his  side,  stared  out  in  the  direction  of  the  nicker. 
Down  the  road,  through  the  swaying  purple  of  the 
early  lilacs,  ridden  by  a  picturesque  cowboy,  paced 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  7 

a  great  horse,  glinting  ruddy  in  the  morning  sun- 
gold,  flinging  free  the  snowy  foam  of  his  mighty  fet 
locks,  his  noble  crest  tossing,  his  eyes  roving  afield, 
the  trumpet  of  his  love-call  echoing  through  the 
springing  land. 

Dick  Forrest  was  smitten  at  the  same  instant  with 
joy  and  anxiety  —  joy  in  the  glorious  beast  pacing 
down  between  the  lilac  hedges;  anxiety  in  that  the 
stallion  might  have  awakened  the  girl  who  laughed 
from  the  round  wooden  frame  on  his  wall.  He 
glanced  quickly  across  the  two-hundred-foot  court  to 
the  long,  shadowy  jut  of  her  wing  of  the  house. 
The  shades  of  her  sleeping-porch  were  down.  They 
did  not  stir.  Again  the  stallion  nickered,  and  all  that 
moved  was  a  flock  of  wild  canaries,  upspringing  from 
the  flowers  and  shrubs  of  the  court,  rising  like  a 
green-gold  spray  of  light  flung  from  the  sunrise. 

He  watched  the  stallion  out  of  sight  through  the 
lilacs,  seeing  visions  of  fair  Shire  colts  mighty  of 
bone  and  frame  and  free  from  blemish,  then  turned, 
as  ever  he  turned  to  the  immediate  thing,  and  spoke 
to  his  body  servant. 

"  How's  that  last  boy,  Oh  My?     Showing  up?  " 

"  Him  pretty  good  boy,  I  think,"  was  the  answer. 
"  Him  young  boy.  Everything  new.  Pretty  slow. 
All  the  same  bime  by  him  show  up  good." 

"  Why?     What  makes  you  think  so?  " 

"  I  call  him  three,  four  morning  nowr.  Him  sleep 
like  baby.  Him  wake  up  smiling  just  like  you. 
That  very  good." 

"  Do  I  wake  up  smiling?  "  Forrest  queried. 

Oh  My  nodded  his  head  violently. 

"  Many  times,  many  years,  I  call  you.     Always 


8  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

your  eyes  open,  your  eyes  smile,  your  mouth  smile, 
your  face  smile,  you  smile  all  over,  just  like  that, 
right  away  quick.  That  very  good.  A  man  wake 
up  that  way  got  plenty  good  sense.  I  know.  This 
new  boy  like  that.  Bime  by,  pretty  soon,  he  make 
fine  boy.  You  see.  His  name  Chow  Gam.  What 
name  you  call  him  this  place?  " 

Dick  Forrest  meditated. 

"  What  names  have  we  already?  "  he  asked. 

"  Oh  Joy,  Ah  Well,  Ah  Me,  and  me;  I  am  Oh 
My,"  the  Chinese  rattled  off.  "  Oh  Joy  him  say 
call  new  boy  — " 

He  hesitated  and  stared  at  his  master  with  a  chal 
lenging  glint  of  eye.  Forrest  nodded. 

"  Oh  Joy  him  say  call  new  boy  '  Oh  Hell.1  " 

"  Oh  ho !  "  Forrest  laughed  in  appreciation. 
"  Oh  Joy  is  a  josher.  A  good  name,  but  it  won't 
do.  There  is  the  Missus.  We've  got  to  think  an 
other  name." 

"  Oh  Ho,  that  very  good  name." 

Forrest's  exclamation  was  still  ringing  in  his  con 
sciousness  so  that  he  recognized  the  source  of  Oh 
My's  inspiration. 

"  Very  well.     The  boy's  name  is  Oh  Ho." 

Oh  My  lowered  his  head,  ebbed  swiftly  through 
the  French  windows,  and  as  swiftly  returned  with  the 
rest  of  Forrest's  clothes-gear,  helping  him  into  under 
shirt  and  shirt,  tossing  a  tie  around  his  neck  for  him 
to  knot,  and,  kneeling,  putting  on  his  leggings  and 
spurs.  A  Baden  Powell  hat  and  a  quirt  completed 
his  appareling  —  the  quirt,  Indian-braided  of  raw 
hide,  with  ten  ounces  of  lead  braided  into  the  butt 
that  hung  from  his  wrist  on  a  loop  of  leather. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  9 

But  Forrest  was  not  yet  free.  Oh  My  handed 
him  several  letters,  with  the  explanation  that  they 
had  come  up  from  the  station  the  previous  night  after 
Forrest  had  gone  to  bed.  He  tore  the  right-hand 
ends  across  and  glanced  at  the  contents  of  all  but 
one  with  speed.  The  latter  he  dwelt  upon  for  a  mo 
ment,  with  an  irritated  indrawing  of  brows,  then 
swung  out  the  phonograph  from  the  wall,  pressed 
the  button  that  made  the  cylinder  revolve,  and  swiftly 
dictated,  without  ever  a  pause  for  word  or  idea : 

"  In  reply  to  yours  of  March  14,  1914,  I  am  indeed  sorry 
to  learn  that  you  were  hit  with  hog  cholera.  I  am  equally 
sorry  that  you  have  seen  fit  to  charge  me  with  the  respon 
sibility.  And  just  as  equally  am  I  sorry  that  the  boar  we 
sent  you  is  dead. 

"  I  can  only  assure  you  that  we  are  quite  clear  of  cholera 
here,  and  that  we  have  been  clear  of  cholera  for  eight  years, 
with  the  exception  of  two  Eastern  importations,  the  last  two 
years  ago,  both  of  which,  according  to  our  custom,  were 
segregated  on  arrival  and  were  destroyed  before  the  con 
tagion  could  be  communicated  to  our  herds. 

"  I  feel  that  I  must  inform  you  that  in  neither  case  did 
I  charge  the  sellers  with  having  sent  me  diseased  stock.  On 
the  contrary,  as  you  should  know,  the  incubation  of  hog 
cholera  being  nine  days,  I  consulted  the  shipping  dates  of 
the  animals  and  knew  that  they  had  been  healthy  when 
shipped. 

"Has  it  ever  entered  your  mind  that  the  railroads  are 
largely  responsible  for  the  spread  of  cholera?  Did  you  ever 
hear  of  a  railroad  fumigating  or  disinfecting  a  car  which 
had  carried  cholera?  Consult  the  dates:  First,  of  ship 
ment  by  me;  second,  of  receipt  of  the  boar  by  you;  and, 
third,  of  appearance  of  symptoms  in  the  boar.  As  you  say, 
because  of  washouts,  the  boar  was  five  days  on  the  way. 
Not  until  the  seventh  day  after  you  receipted  for  same  did 
the  first  symptoms  appear.  That  makes  twelve  days  after 
it  left  my  hands. 


10 


THE  LITTLE  LADY 


"No;  I  must  disagree  with  you.     I   am  not  responsible 
for   the   disaster   that   overtook   your   herd.     Furthermore, 
doubly  to  assure  you,  write  to  the  State  Veterinary  as  to 
whether  or  not  my  place  is  free  of  cholera. 
"  Very  truly  yours  .  .  ." 


CHAPTER  II 

WHEN  Forrest  went  through  the  French  win 
dows  from  his  sleeping-porch,  he  crossed, 
first,  a  comfortable  dressing  room,  window- 
divaned,  many-lockered,  with  a  generous  fireplace, 
out  of  which  opened  a  bathroom;  and,  second,  a  long 
office  room,  wherein  was  all  the  paraphernalia  of 
business  —  desks,  dictaphones,  filing  cabinets,  book 
cases,  magazine  files,  and  drawer-pigeonholes  that 
tiered  to  the  low,  beamed  ceiling. 

Midway  in  the  office  room,  he  pressed  a  button 
and  a  series  of  book-freightened  shelves  swung  on  a 
pivot,  revealing  a  tiny  spiral  stairway  of  steel,  which 
he  descended  with  care  that  his  spurs  might  not  catch, 
the  bookshelves  swinging  into  place  behind  him. 

At  the  foot  of  the  stairway,  a  press  on  another 
button  pivoted  more  shelves  of  books  and  gave  him 
entrance  into  a  long  low  room  shelved  with  books 
from  floor  to  ceiling.  He  went  directly  to  a  case, 
directly  to  a  shelf,  and  unerringly  laid  his  hand  on 
the  book  he  sought.  A  minute  he  ran  the  pages, 
found  the  passage  he  was  after,  nodded  his  head  to 
himself  in  vindication,  and  replaced  the  book. 

A  door  gave  way  to  a  pergola  of  square  concrete 
columns  spanned  with  redwood  logs  and  interlaced 
with  smaller  trunks  of  redwood,  all  rough  and 
crinkled  velvet  with  the  ruddy  purple  of  the  bark. 

ii 


12  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

It  was  evident,  since  he  had  to  skirt  several  hun 
dred  feet  of  concrete  walls  of  wandering  house,  that 
he  had  not  taken  the  short  way  out.  Under  wide- 
spreading  ancient  oaks,  where  the  long  hitching-rails, 
bark-chewed,  and  the  hoof-beaten  gravel  showed  the 
stamping  place  of  many  horses,  he  found  a  pale- 
golden,  almost  tan-golden,  sorrel  mare.  Her  well- 
groomed  spring  coat  was  alive  and  flaming  in  the 
morning  sun  that  slanted  straight  under  the  edge  of 
the  roof  of  trees.  She  was  herself  alive  and  flaming. 
She  was  built  like  a  stallion,  and  down  her  backbone 
ran  a  narrow  dark  strip  of  hair  that  advertised  an 
ancestry  of  many  range  mustangs. 

"  How's  the  Man-Eater  this  morning? "  he 
queried,  as  he  unsnapped  the  tie-rope  from  her 
throat. 

She  laid  back  the  tiniest  ears  that  ever  a  horse 
possessed  —  ears  that  told  of  some  thoroughbred's 
wild  loves  with  wild  mares  among  the  hills  —  and 
snapped  at  Forrest  with  wicked  teeth  and  wicked- 
gleaming  eyes. 

She  sidled  and  attempted  to  rear  as  he  swung  into 
the  saddle,  and,  sidling  and  attempting  to  rear,  she 
went  off  down  the  graveled  road.  And  rear  she 
would  have,  had  it  not  been  for  the  martingale  that 
held  her  head  down  and  that,  as  well,  saved  the 
rider's  nose  from  her  angry-tossing  head. 

So  used  was  he  to  the  mare,  that  he  was  scarcely 
aware  of  her  antics.  Automatically,  with  slightest 
touch  of  rein  against  arched  neck,  or  with  tickle  of 
spur  or  press  of  knee,  he  kept  the  mare  to  the  way 
he  willed.  Once,  as  she  whirled  and  danced,  he 
caught  a  glimpse  of  the  Big  House.  Big  it  was  in 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  13 

all  seeming,  and  yet,  such  was  the  vagrant  nature  of 
it,  it  was  not  so  big  as  it  seemed.  Eight  hundred 
feet  across  the  front  face,  it  stretched.  But  much  of 
this  eight  hundred  feet  was  composed  of  mere  corri 
dors,  concrete-walled,  tile-roofed,  that  connected  and 
assembled  the  various  parts  of  the  building.  There 
were  patios  and  pergolas  in  proportion,  and  all  the 
walls,  with  their  many  right-angled  juts  and  reces 
sions,  arose  out  of  a  bed  of  greenery  and  bloom. 

Spanish  in  character,  the  architecture  of  the  Big 
House  was  not  of  the  California-Spanish  type  which 
had  been  introduced  by  way  of  Mexico  a  hundred 
years  before,  and  which  had  been  modified  by  modern 
architects  to  the  California-Spanish  architecture  of 
the  day.  Hispano-Moresque  more  technically  classi 
fied  the  Big  House  in  all  its  hybridness,  although 
there  were  experts  who  heatedly  quarreled  with  the 
term. 

<  Spaciousness  without  austerity  and  beauty  without 
ostentation  were  the  fundamental  impressions  the 
Big  House  gave.  Its  lines,  long  and  horizontal, 
broken  only  by  lines  that  were  vertical  and  by  the 
lines  of  juts  and  recesses  that  were  always  right- 
angled,  were  as  chaste  as  those  of  a  monastery.  The 
irregular  roof-line,  however,  relieved  the  hint  of 
monotony. 

Low  and  rambling,  without  being  squat,  the  square 
upthrusts  of  towers  and  of  towers  over-topping 
towers  gave  just  proportion  of  height  without  being 
sky-aspiring.  The  sense  of  the  Big  House  was 
solidarity.  It  defied  earthquakes.  It  was  planted 
for  a  thousand  years.  ,!>  The  honest  concrete  was 
overlaid  by  a  cream-stucco  of  honest  cement.  Again, 


i4  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

this  very  sameness  of  color  might  have  proved 
monotonous  to  the  eye  had  it  not  been  saved  by  the 
many  flat  roofs  of  warm-red  Spanish  tile. 

In  that  one  sweeping  glance  while  the  mare  whirled 
unduly,  Dick  Forrest's  eyes,  embracing  all  of  the  Big 
House,  centered  for  a  quick  solicitous  instant  on  the 
great  wing  across  the  two-hundred-foot  court,  where, 
under  climbing  groups  of  towers,  red-snooded  in  the 
morning  sun,  the  drawn  shades  of  the  sleeping-porch 
tokened  that  his  lady  still  slept. 

About  him,  for  three  quadrants  of  the  circle  of  the 
world,  arose  low-rolling  hills,  smooth,  fenced, 
cropped,  and  pastured,  that  melted  into  higher  hills 
and  steeper  wooded  slopes  that  merged  upward, 
steeper,  into  mighty  mountains.  The  fourth  quad 
rant  was  unbounded  by  mountain  walls  and  hills.  It 
faded  away,  descending  easily  to  vast  far  flat-lands, 
which,  despite  the  clear  brittle  air  of  frost,  were  too 
vast  and  far  to  scan  across. 

The  mare  under  him  snorted.  His  knees  tight 
ened  as  he  straightened  her  into  the  road  and  forced 
her  to  one  side.  Down  upon  him,  with  a  pattering 
of  feet  on  the  gravel,  flowed  a  river  of  white  shim 
mering  silk.  He  knew  it  at  sight  for  his  prize  herd 
of  Angora  goats,  each  with  a  pedigree,  each  with  a 
history.  There  had  to  be  a  near  two  hundred  of 
them,  and  he  knew,  according  to  the  rigorous  selec 
tion  he  commanded,  not  having  been  clipped  in  the 
fall,  that  the  shining  mohair  draping  the  sides  of  the 
least  of  them,  as  fine  as  any  human  new-born  baby's 
hair  and  finer,  as  white  as  any  human  albino's  thatch 
and  whiter,  was  longer  than  the  twelve-inch  staple, 
and  that  the  mohair  of  the  best  of  them  would  dye 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  15 

any  color  into  twenty-inch  switches  for  women's  heads 
and  sell  at  prices  unreasonable  and  profound. 

The  beauty  of  the  sight  held  him  as  well.  The 
roadway  had  become  a  flowing  ribbon  of  silk, 
gemmed  with  yellow  cat-like  eyes  that  floated  past 
wary  and  curious  in  their  regard  for  him  and  his 
nervous  horse.  Two  Basque  herders  brought  up  the 
rear.  They  were  short,  broad,  swarthy  men,  black- 
eyed,  vivid-faced,  contemplative  and  philosophic  of 
expression.  They  pulled  off  their  hats  and  ducked 
their  heads  to  him.  Forrest  lifted  his  right  hand, 
the  quirt  dangling  from  wrist,  the  straight  forefinger 
touching  the  rim  of  his  Baden  Powell  in  semi-military 
salute. 

The  mare,  prancing  and  whirling  again,  he  held 
her  with  a  touch  of  rein  and  threat  of  spur,  and  gazed 
after  the  four-footed  silk  that  filled  the  road  with 
shimmering  white.  He  knew  the  significance  of  their 
presence.  The  time  for  kidding  was  approaching 
and  they  were  being  brought  down  from  their  brush- 
pastures  to  the  brood-pens  and  shelters  for  jealous 
care  and  generous  feed  through  the  period  of  in 
crease.  And  as  he  gazed,  in  his  mind,  comparing, 
was  a  vision  of  all  the  best  of  Turkish  and  South 
African  mohair  he  had  ever  seen,  and  his  flock  bore 
the  comparison  well.  It  looked  good.  It  looked 
very  good. 

He  rode  on.  From  all  about  arose  the  clacking 
whir  of  manure-spreaders.  In  the  distance,  on  the 
low,  easy-sloping  hills,  he  saw  team  after  team,  and 
many  teams,  three  to  a  team  abreast,  what  he  knew 
were  his  Shire  mares,  drawing  the  plows  back  and 
forth  across,  contour-plowing,  turning  the  green  sod 


1 6  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

of  the  hillsides  to  the  rich  dark  brown  of  humus-filled 
earth  so  organic  and  friable  that  it  would  almost 
melt  by  gravity  into  fine-particled  seed-bed.  That 
was  for  the  corn-  and  sorghum-planting  for  his  silos. 
Other  hill-slopes,  in  the  due  course  of  his  rotation, 
were  knee-high  in  barley;  and  still  other  slopes  were 
showing  the  good  green  of  burr  clover  and  Canada 
pea. 

Everywhere  about  him,  large  fields  and  small  were 
arranged  in  a  system  of  accessibility  and  workability 
that  would  have  warmed  the  heart  of  the  most  metic 
ulous  efficiency-expert.  Every  fence  was  hog-tight 
and  bull-proof,  and  no  weeds  grew  in  the  shelters  of 
the  fences.  Many  of  the  level  fields  were  in  alfalfa. 
Others,  following  the  rotations,  bore  crops  planted 
the  previous  fall,  or  were  in  preparation  for  the 
spring-planting.  Still  others,  close  to  the  brood 
barns  and  pens,  were  being  grazed  by  rotund  Shrop 
shire  and  French-Merino  ewes,  or  were  being  hogged 
off  by  white  Gargantuan  brood-sowrs  that  brought  a 
flash  of  pleasure  in  his  eyes  as  he  rode  past  and 
gazed. 

He  rode  through  what  was  almost  a  village,  save 
that  there  were  neither  shops  nor  hotels.  The 
houses  were  bungalows,  substantial,  pleasing  to  the 
eye,  each  set  in  the  midst  of  gardens  where  stouter 
blooms,  including  roses,  were  out  and  smiling  at  the 
threat  of  late  frost.  Children  were  already  astir, 
laughing  and  playing  among  the  flowers  or  being 
called  in  to  breakfast  by  their  mothers. 

Beyond,  beginning  at  a  half-mile  distant  to  circle 
the  Big  House,  he  passed  a  row  of  shops.  He 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  17 

paused  at  the  first  and  glanced  in.  One  smith  was 
working  at  a  forge.  A  second  smith,  a  shoe  fresh- 
nailed  on  the  fore-foot  of  an  elderly  Shire  mare  that 
would  disturb  the  scales  at  eighteen  hundred  weight, 
was  rasping  down  the  outer  wall  of  the  hoof  to 
smooth  with  the  toe  of  the  shoe.  Forrest  saw, 
saluted,  rode  on,  and,  a  hundred  feet  away,  paused 
and  scribbled  a  memorandum  in  the  notebook  he  drew 
from  his  hip-pocket. 

He  passed  other  shops  —  a  paint-shop,  a  wagon- 
shop,  a  plumbing  shop,  a  carpenter-shop.  While  he 
glanced  at  the  last,  a  hybrid  machine,  half-auto,  half- 
truck,  passed  him  at  speed  and  took  the  main  road 
for  the  railroad  station  eight  miles  away.  He  knew 
it  for  the  morning  butter-truck  freighting  from  the 
separator  house  the  daily  output  of  the  dairy. 

The  Big  House  was  the  hub  of  the  ranch  organiza 
tion.  Half  a  mile  from  it,  it  was  encircled  by  the 
various  ranch  centers.  Dick  Forrest,  saluting  con 
tinually  his  people,  passed  at  a  gallop  the  dairy 
center,  which  was  almost  a  sea  of  buildings  with  bat 
teries  of  silos  and  with  litter  carriers  emerging  on 
overhead  tracks  and  automatically  dumping  into  wait 
ing  manure-spreaders.  Several  times,  business-look 
ing  men,  college-marked,  astride  horses  or  driving 
carts,  stopped  him  and  conferred  with  him.  They 
were  foremen,  heads  of  departments,  and  they  were 
as  brief  and  to  the  point  as  was  he.  The  last  of 
them,  astride  a  Palomina  three-year-old  that  was  as 
graceful  and  wild  as  a  half-broken  Arab,  was  for 
riding  by  with  a  bare  salute,  but  was  stopped  by  his 
employer. 


1 8  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  Good  morning,  Mr.  Hennessy,  and  how  soon 
will  she  be  ready  for  Mrs.  Forrest?  "  Dick  Forrest 
asked. 

"  I'd  like  another  week,"  was  Hennessy's  answer. 
"  She's  well  broke  now,  just  the  way  Mrs.  Forrest 
wanted,  but  she's  over-strung  and  sensitive  and  I'd 
like  the  week  more  to  set  her  in  her  ways." 

Forrest  nodded  concurrence,  and  Hennessy,  who 
was  the  veterinary,  went  on : 

u  There  are  two  drivers  in  the  alfalfa  gang  I'd 
like  to  send  down  the  hill." 

"  What's  the  matter  with  them?  " 

"  One,  a  new  man,  Hopkins,  is  an  ex-soldier.  He 
may  know  government  mules,  but  he  doesn't  know 
Shires." 

Forrest  nodded. 

"  The  other  has  worked  for  us  two  years,  but  he's 
drinking  now,  and  he  takes  his  hang-overs  out  on  his 
horses  — " 

"  That's  Smith,  oldrtype  American,  smooth-shaven, 
with  a  cast  in  his  left  eye?"  Forrest  interrupted. 

The  veterinary  nodded. 

"  I've  been  watching  him,"  Forrest  concluded. 
"  He  was  a  good  man  at  first,  but  he's  slipped  a  cog 
recently.  Sure,  send  him  down  the  hill.  And  send 
that  other  fellow  —  Hopkins,  you  said?  —  along 
with  him.  By  the  way,  Mr.  Hennessy."  As  he 
spoke,  Forrest  drew  forth  his  pad  book,  tore  off  the 
last  note  scribbled,  and  crumpled  it  in  his  hand. 
"  You've  a  new  horse-shoer  in  the  shop.  How  does 
he  strike  you?  " 

"  He's  too  new  to  make  up  my  mind  yet." 

"Well,  send  him  down  the  hill  along  with  the 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  19 

other  two.  He  can't  take  your  orders.  I  observed 
him  just  now  fitting  a  shoe  to  old  Alden  Bessie  by 
rasping  off  half  an  inch  of  the  toe  of  her  hoof." 

"  He  knew  better." 

"  Send  him  down  the  hill,"  Forrest  repeated,  as  he 
tickled  his  champing  mount  with  the  slightest  of  spur- 
tickles  and  shot  her  out  along  the  road,  sidling,  head- 
tossing,  and  attempting  to  rear. 

Much  he  saw  that  pleased  him.  Once,  he  mur 
mured  aloud,  "  A  fat  land,  a  fat  land."  Divers 
things  he  saw  that  did  not  please  him  and  that  won 
a  note  in  his  scribble  pad.  Completing  the  circle 
about  the  Big  House  and  riding  beyond  the  circle 
half  a  mile  to  an  isolated  group  of  sheds  and  corrals, 
he  reached  the  objective  of  the  ride:  the  hospital. 
Here  he  found  but  two  young  heifers  being  tested  for 
tuberculosis,  and  a  magnificent  Duroc  Jersey  boar  in 
magnificent  condition.  Weighing  fully  six  hundred 
pounds,  its  bright  eyes,  brisk  movements,  and  sheen 
of  hair  shouted  out  that  there  was  nothing  the  mat 
ter  with  it.  Nevertheless,  according  to  the  ranch 
practice,  being  a  fresh  importation  from  Iowa,  it 
was  undergoing  the  regular  period  of  quarantine. 
Burgess  Premier  was  its  name  in  the  herd  books  of 
the  association,  age  two  years,  and  it  had  cost  For 
rest  five  hundred  dollars  laid  down  on  the  ranch. 

Proceeding  at  a  hand  gallop  along  a  road  that  was 
one  of  the  spokes  radiating  from  the  Big  House  hub, 
Forrest  overtook  Crellin,  his  hog  manager,  and,  in  a 
five-minute  conference,  outlined  the  next  few  months 
of  destiny  of  Burgess  Premier,  and  learned  that  the 
brood  sow,  Lady  Isleton,  the  matron  of  all  matrons 
of  'he  O.  I.  C.'s  and  blue-ribboner  in  all  shows  from 


20  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

Seattle  to  San  Diego,  was  safely  farrowed  of  eleven. 
Crellin  explained  that  he  had  sat  up  half  the  night 
with  her  and  was  then  bound  home  for  bath  and 
breakfast. 

"  I  hear  your  oldest  daughter  has  finished  high 
school  and  wants  to  enter  Stanford,"  Forrest  said, 
curbing  the  mare  just  as  he  had  half-signaled  depart 
ure  at  a  gallop. 

Crellin,  a  young  man  of  thirty-five,  with  the  ma 
turity  of  a  long-time  father  stamped  upon  him  along 
with  the  marks  of  college  and  the  youthfulness  of  a 
man  used  to  the  open  air  and  straight-living,  showed 
his  appreciation  of  his  employer's  interest  as  he  half- 
flushed  under  his  tan  and  nodded. 

'  Think  it  over,"  Forrest  advised.  "  Make  a 
statistic  of  all  the  college  girls  —  yes,  and  State  Nor 
mal  girls  —  you  know.  How  many  of  them  follow 
career,  and  how  many  of  them  marry  within  two 
years  after  their  degrees  and  take  to  baby  farming." 

"  Helen  is  very  seriously  bent  on  the  matter," 
Crellin  urged. 

"  Do  you  remember  when  I  had  my  appendix 
out?  "  Forrest  queried.  "  Well,  I  had  as  fine  a  nurse 
as  I  ever  saw  and  as  nice  a  girl  as  ever  walked  on 
two  nice  legs.  She  was  just  six  months  a  full-fledged 
nurse,  then.  And  four  months  after  that  I  had  to 
send  her  a  wedding  present.  She  married  an  auto 
mobile  .agent.  She's  lived  in  hotels  ever  since. 
She's  never  had  a  chance  to  nurse  —  never  a  child  of 
her  own  to  bring  through  a  bout  with  colic.  But 
.  .  .  she  has  hopes  .  .  .  and,  whether  or  not  her 
hopes  materialize,  she's  confoundedly  happy.  But 
.  .  .  what  good  was  her  nursing  apprenticeship?  " 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  21 

Just  then  an  empty  manure-spreader  passed,  forc 
ing  Crellin,  on  foot,  and  Forrest,  on  his  mare,  to 
edge  over  to  the  side  of  the  road.  Forrest  glanced 
with  kindling  eye  at  the  off  mare  of  the  machine,  a 
huge,  symmetrical  Shire  whose  own  blue  ribbons, 
and  the  blue  ribbons  of  her  progeny,  would  have  re 
quired  an  expert  accountant  to  enumerate  and 
classify. 

"  Look  at  the  Fotherington  Princess,"  Forrest 
said,  nodding  at  the  mare  that  warmed  his  eye. 
"  She  is  a  normal  female.  Only  incidentally,  through 
thousands  of  years  of  domestic  selection,  has  man 
evolved  her  into  a  draught  beast  breeding  true  to 
kind.  But  being  a  draught-beast  is  secondary. 
Primarily  she  is  a  female.  Take  them  by  and  large, 
our  own  human  females,  above  all  else,  love  us  men 
and  are  intrinsically  maternal.  There  is  no 
biological  sanction  for  all  the  hurly  burly  of  woman 
to-day  for  suffrage  and  career." 

"  But  there  is  an  economic  sanction,"  Crellin  ob 
jected. 

"  True,"  his  employer  agreed,  then  proceeded  to 
discount.  "  Our  present  industrial  system  prevents 
marriage  and  compels  woman  to  career.  But,  re 
member,  industrial  systems  come,  and  industrial  sys 
tems  go,  while  biology  runs  on  forever." 

"  It's  rather  hard  to  satisfy  young  women  with 
marriage  these  days,"  the  hog-manager  demurred. 

Dick  Forrest  laughed  incredulously. 

"I  don't  know  about  that,"  he  said.  v«  'There's 
your  wife  for  an  instance.  She  with  her  sheepskin 
—  classical  scholar  at  that  —  well,  what  has  she  done 
with  it?  ...  Two  boys  and  three  girls,  I  believe? 


22  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

As  I  remember  your  telling  me,  she  was  engaged  to 
you  the  whole  last  half  of  her  senior  year." 

"  True,  but  — "  Crellin  insisted,  with  an  eye- 
twinkle  of  appreciation  of  the  point,  "  that  was 
fifteen  years  ago,  as  well  as  a  love-match.  We  just 
couldn't  help  it.  That  far,  I  agree.  She  had 
planned  unheard-of  achievements,  while  I  saw  noth 
ing  else  than  the  deanship  of  the  College  of  Agricul 
ture.  We  just  couldn't  help  it.  But  that  was  fifteen 
years  ago,  and  fifteen  years  have  made  all  the  differ 
ence  in  the  world  in  the  ambitions  and  ideals  of  our 
young  women." 

"  Don't  you  believe  it  for  a  moment.  I  tell  you, 
Mr.  Crellin,  it's  a  statistic.  All  contrary  things  are 
transient.  Ever  woman  remains  woman,  everlast 
ing,  eternal.  Not  until  our  girl-children  cease  from 
playing  with  dolls  and  from  looking  at  their  own  en- 
ticingness  in  mirrors,  will  woman  ever  be  otherwise 
than  what  she  has  always  been:  first,  the  mother,  sec 
ond,  the  mate  of  man.  It  is  a  statistic.  I've  been 
looking  up  the  girls  who  graduate  from  the  State 
Normal.  You  will  notice  that  those  who  marry  by 
the  way  before  graduation  are  excluded.  Neverthe 
less,  the  average  length  of  time  the  graduates  actu 
ally  teach  school  is  little  more  than  two  years.  And 
when  you  consider  that  a  lot  of  them,  through  ill 
looks  and  ill  luck,  are  foredoomed  old  maids  and  are 
foredoomed  to  teach  all  their  lives,  you  can  see  how 
they  cut  down  the  period  of  teaching  of  the  mar 
riageable  ones." 

"  A  woman,  even  a  girl-woman,  will  have  her  way 
where  mere  men  are  concerned,"  Crellin  muttered, 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  23 

unable  to  dispute  his  employer's  figures  but  resolved 
to  look  them  up. 

"  And  your  girl-woman  will  go  to  Stanford,"  For 
rest  laughed,  as  he  prepared  to  lift  his  mare  into  a 
gallop,  "  and  you  and  I  and  all  men,  to  the  end  of 
time,  will  see  to  it  that  they  do  have  their  way." 

Crellin  smiled  to  himself  as  his  employer  dimin 
ished  down  the  road;  for  Crellin  knew  his  Kipling, 
and  the  thought  that  .caused  the  smile  was :  "  But 
where's  the  kid  of  your  own,  Mr.  Forrest?  "  He 
decided  to  repeat  it  to  Mrs.  Crellin  over  the  break 
fast  coffee. 

Once  again  Dick  Forrest  delayed  ere  he  gained  the 
Big  House.  The  man  he  stopped  he  addressed  as 
Mendenhall,  who  was  his  horse-manager  as  well  as 
pasture  expert,  and  who  was  reputed  to  know,  not 
only  every  blade  of  grass  on  the  ranch,  but  the  length 
of  every  blade  of  grass  and  its  age  from  seed-germi 
nation  as  well. 

At  signal  from  Forrest,  Mendenhall  drew  up  the 
two  colts  he  was  driving  in  a  double  breaking-cart. 
What  had  caused  Forrest  to  signal  was  a  glance  he 
had  caught,  across  the  northern  edge  of  the  valley,  of 
great,  smooth-hill  ranges  miles  beyond,  touched  by 
the  sun  and  deeply  green  where  they  projected  into 
the  vast  flat  of  the  Sacramento  Valley. 

The  talk  that  followed  was  quick  and  abbrevi 
ated  to  terms  of  understanding  between  two  men  who 
knew.  Grass  was  the  subject.  Mention  was  made 
of  the  winter  rainfall  and  of  the  chance  for  late 
spring  rains  to  come.  Names  occurred,  such  as  the 
Little  Coyote  and  Los  Cuatos  creeks,  the  Yolo  and 


24  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

the  Miramar  hills,  the  Big  Basin,  Round  Valley,  and 
the  San  Anselmo  and  Los  Banos  ranges.     Move 
ments  of  herds  and  droves,  past,  present,   and  to 
come,  were  discussed,  as  well  as  the  outlook  for  cult' 
vated  hay  in  far  upland  pastures  and  the  estimat 
of  such  hay  that  still  remained  over  the  winter  in  re 
mote  barns  in  the  sheltered  mountain  valleys  where 
herds  had  wintered  and  been  fed. 

Under  the  oaks,  at  the  stamping  posts,  Forrest 
was  saved  the  trouble  of  tying  the  Man-Eater.  A 
stableman  came  on  the  run  to  take  the  mare,  and  For 
rest,  scarce  pausing  for  a  word  about  a  horse  by  the 
name  of  Buddy,  was  clanking  his  spurs  into  the  Big 
House. 


CHAPTER  III 

FORREST  entered  a  section  of  the  Big  House 
by  way  of  a  massive,  hewn-timber,  iron- 
studded  door  that  let  in  at  the  foot  of  what 
seemed  a  donjon  keep.  The  floor  was  cement,  and 
doors  let  off  in  various  directions.  One,  opening  to 
a  Chinese  in  the  white  apron  and  starched  cap  of  a 
chef,  emitted  at  the  same  time  the  low  hum  of  a 
dynamo.  It  was  this  that  deflected  Forrest  from  his 
straight  path.  He  paused,  holding  the  door  ajar, 
and  peered  into  a  cool,  electric-lighted  cement  room 
where  stood  a  long,  glass-fronted,  glass-shelved  re 
frigerator  flanked  by  an  ice-machine  and  a  dynamo. 
On  the  floor,  in  greasy  overalls,  squatted  a  greasy 
little  man  to  whom  his  employer  nodded. 

"Anything  wrong,  Thompson?"  he  asked. 

u  There  was/'  was  the  answer,  positive  and  com 
plete. 

Forrest  closed  the  door  and  went  on  along  a  pas 
sage  that  was  like  a  tunnel.  Narrow,  iron-barred 
openings,  like  the  slits  for  archers  in  medieval  castles, 
dimly  lighted  the  way.  Another  door  gave  access 
to  a  long,  low  room,  beam-ceilinged,  with  a  fireplace 
in  which  an  ox  could  have  been  roasted.  A  huge 
stump,  resting  on  a  bed  of  coals,  blazed  brightly. 
Two  billiard  tables,  several  card  tables,  lounging 
corners,  and  a  miniature  bar  constituted  the  major 

25 


26  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

furnishing.     Two  young  men  chalked  their  cues  and 
returned  Forrest's  greeting. 

"  Good  morning,  Mr.  Naismith,"  he  bantered. 
" — More  material  for  the  Breeders'  Gazette?" 

Naismith,  a  youngish  man  of  thirty,  with  glasses, 
smiled  sheepishly  and  cocked  his  head  at  his  com 
panion. 

'  Wainwright  challenged  me,"  he  explained. 

;<  Which  means  that  Lute  and  Ernestine  must  still 
be  beauty-sleeping,"  Forrest  laughed. 

Young  Wainwright  bristled  to  acceptance  of  the 
challenge,  but  before  he  could  utter  the  retort  on  his 
lips  his  host  was  moving  on  and  addressing  Naismith 
over  his  shoulder. 

u  Do  you  want  to  come  along  at  eleven  ithirty? 
Thayer  and  I  are  running  out  in  the  machine  to  look 
over  the  Shropshires.  He  wants  about  ten  carloads 
of  rams.  You  ought  to  find  good  stuff  in  this  matter 
of  Idaho  shipments.  Bring  your  camera  along. 
—  Seen  Thayer  this  morning?  " 

"  Just  came  in  to  breakfast  as  we  were  leaving," 
Bert  Wainwright  volunteered. 

"  Tell  him  to  be  ready  at  eleven-thirty  if  you  see 
him.  You're  not  invited,  Bert  .  .  .  out  of  kind 
ness.  The  girls  are  sure  to  be  up  then." 

"  Take  Rita  along  with  you  anyway,"  Bert 
pleaded. 

"  No  fear,"  was  Forrest's  reply  from  the  door. 
"  We're  on  business.  Besides,  you  can't  pry  Rita 
from  Ernestine  with  block-and-tackle." 

"  That's  why  I  wanted  to  see  if  you  could,"  Bert 
grinned. 

"  Funny  how  fellows  never  appreciate  their  own 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  27 

sisters."  Forrest  paused  for  a  perceptible  moment. 
"  I  always  thought  Rita  was  a  real  nice  sister. 
What's  the  matter  with  her?" 

Before  a  reply  could  reach  him,  he  had  closed  the 
door  and  was  jingling  his  spurs  along  the  passage  to 
a  spiral  stairway  of  broad  concrete  steps.  As  he 
left  the  head  of  the  stairway,  a  dance-time  piano 
measure  and  burst  of  laughter  made  him  peep  into 
a  white  morning  room,  flooded  with  sunshine.  A 
young  girl,  in  rose-colored  kimono  and  bou 
doir  cap,  was  at  the  instrument,  while  two  others, 
similarly  accoutered,  in  each  other's  arms,  were  par 
odying  a  dance  never  learned  at  dancing  school 
nor  intended  by  the  participants  for  male  eyes  to 
see. 

The  girl  at  the  piano  discovered  him,  winked,  and 
played  on.  Not  for  another  minute  did  the  dancers 
spy  him.  They  gave  startled  cries,  collapsed,  laugh 
ing,  in  each  other's  arms,  and  the  music  stopped. 
They  were  gorgeous,  healthy  young  creatures,  the 
three  of  them,  and  Forrest's  eye  kindled  as  he  looked 
at  them  in  quite  the  same  way  that  it  had  kindled 
when  he  regarded  the  Fotherington  Princess. 

Persiflage,  of  the  sort  that  obtains  among  young 
things  of  the  human  kind,  flew  back  and  forth. 

"  I've  t>een  here  five  minutes,"  Dick  Forrest  as 
serted. 

The  two  dancers,  to  cover  their  confusion,  doubted 
his  veracity  and  instanced  his  many  well-known  and 
notorious  guilts  of  mendacity.  The  girl  at  the 
piano,  Ernestine,  his  sister-in-law,  insisted  that  pearls 
of  truth  fell  from  his  lips,  that  she  had  seen  him 
from  the  moment  he  began  to  look,  and  that  as  she 


28  THE  LITTLE  LADY 


estimated  the  passage  of  time  he  had  been  looking 
much  longer  than  five  minutes. 

'*  Well,  anyway,"  Forrest  broke  in  on  their  babel, 
"  Bert,  the  sweet  innocent,  doesn't  think  you  are  up 
yet." 

'  We're  not  ...  to  him,"  one  of  the  dancers,  a 
vivacious  young  Venus,  retorted.  "  Nor  are  we  to 
you  either.  So  run  along,  little  boy.  Run  along." 

"  Look  here,  Lute,"  Forrest  began  sternly. 
*  Just  because  I  am  a  decrepit  old  man,  and  just  be 
cause  you  are  eighteen,  just  eighteen,  and  happen  to 
be  my  wife's  sister,  you  needn't  presume  to  put  the 
high  and  mighty  over  on  me.  Don't  forget  —  and  I 
state  the  fact,  disagreeable  as  it  may  be,  for  Rita's 
sake  —  don't  forget  that  in  the  past  ten  years  I've 
paddled  you  more  disgraceful  times  than  you  care  to 
dare  me  to  enumerate. 

"  It  is  true,  I  am  not  so  young  as  I  used  to  was, 
but — "  He  felt  the  biceps  of  his  right  arm  and 
made  as  if  to  roll  up  the  sleeve.  " —  But,  I'm  not 
all  in  yet,  and  for  two  cents  .  .  ." 

"  What?  "  the  young  woman  challenged  belliger 
ently. 

"  For  two  cents,"  he  muttered  darkly.  "  For  two 
cents  .  .  .  Besides,  and  it  grieves  me  to  inform  you, 
your  cap  is  not  on  straight.  Also,  it  is  not  a  very 
tasteful  creation  at  best.  I  could  make  a  far  more 
becoming  cap  with  my  toes,  asleep,  and  .  .  .  yes, 
seasick  as  well." 

Lute  tossed  her  blond  head  defiantly,  glanced  at 
her  comrades  in  solicitation  of  support,  and  said: 

"  Oh,  I  don't  know.  It  seems  humanly  reason 
able  that  the  three  of  us  can  woman-handle  a  mere 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  29 

man  of  your  elderly  and  insulting  avoirdupois. 
What  do  you  say,  girls?  Let's  rush  him.  He's  not 
a  minute  under  forty,  and  he  has  an  aneurism.  Yes, 
and  though  loath  to  divulge  family  secrets,  he's  got 
Meniere's  Disease." 

Ernestine,  a  small  but  robust  blonde  of  eighteen, 
sprang  from  the  piano  and  joined  her  two  comrades 
in  a  raid  on  the  cushions  of  the  deep  window  seats. 
Side  by  side,  a  cushion  in  each  hand,  and  with  proper 
distance  between  them  cannily  established  for  the 
swinging  of  the  cushions,  they  advanced  upon  the 
foe. 

Forrest  prepared  for  battle,  then  held  up  his  hand 
for  parley. 

"  'Fraid  cat!  "  they  taunted,  in  several  at  first,  and 
then  in  chorus. 

He  shook  his  head  emphatically. 

"  Just  for  that,  and  for  all  the  rest  of  your  in 
solences,  the  three  of  you  are  going  to  get  yours. 
All  the  wrongs  of  a  lifetime  are  rising  now  in  my 
brain  in  a  dazzling  brightness.  I  shall  go  Berserk 
in  a  moment.  But  first,  and  I  speak  as  an  agricul 
turist,  and  I  address  myself  to  you,  Lute,  in  all  hu 
mility,  in  heaven's  name  what  is  Meniere's  Disease? 
Do  sheep  catch  it?" 

"  Meniere's  Disease  is,"  Lute  began,  ...  u  is 
what  you've  got.  Sheep  are  the  only  known  living 
creatures  that  get  it." 

Ensued  red  war  and  chaos,  Forrest  made  a  foot 
ball  rush  of  the  sort  that  obtained  in  California  be 
fore  the  adoption  of  Rugby;  and  the  girls  broke  the 
line  to  let  him  through,  turned  upon  him,  flanked 
him  on  either  side,  and  pounded  him  with  cushions. 


30  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

He  turned,  with  widespread  arms,  extended  fingers, 
each  finger  a  hook,  and  grappled  the  three.  The 
battle  became  a  whirlwind,  a  be-spurred  man  the  cen 
ter,  from  which  radiated  flying  draperies  of  flimsy 
silk,  disconnected  slippers,  boudoir  caps,  and  hair 
pins.  There  were  thuds  from  the  cushions,  grunts 
from  the  man,  squeals,  yelps  and  giggles  from  the 
girls,  and  from  the  totality  of  the  combat  inextin 
guishable  laughter  and  a  ripping  and  tearing  of  fra 
gile  textures. 

Dick  Forrest  found  himself  sprawled  on  the  floor, 
the  wind  half  knocked  out  of  him  by  shrewdly  de 
livered  cushions,  his  head  buzzing  from  the  buffeting, 
and,  in  one  hand,  a  trailing,  torn,  and  generally  dis 
rupted  girdle  of  pale  blue  silk  and  pink  roses. 

In  one  doorway,  cheeks  flaming  from  the  struggle, 
stood  Rita,  alert  as  a  fawn  and  ready  to  flee.  In 
the  other  doorway,  likewise  flame-checked,  stood 
Ernestine  in  the  commanding  attitude  of  the  Mother 
of  the  Gracchi,  the  wreckage  of  her  kimono  wrapped 
severely  about  her  and  held  severely  about  her  by 
her  own  waist-pressing  arm.  Lute,  cornered  behind 
the  piano,  attempted  to  run  but  was  driven  back  by 
the  menace  of  Forrest,  who,  on  hands  and  knees, 
stamped  loudly  with  the  palms  of  his  hands  on  the 
hardwood  floor,  rolled  his  head  savagely,  and 
emitted  bull-like  roars. 

"  And  they  still  believe  that  old  prehistoric  myth^" 
Ernestine  proclaimed  from  safety,  "  that  once  he, 
that  wretched  semblance  of  a  man-thing  prone  in 
the  dirt,  captained  Berkeley  to  victory  over  Stan 
ford." 

Her  breasts  heaved  from  the  exertion,  and  he 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  31 

marked  the  pulsating  of  the  shimmering  cherry-col 
ored  silk  with  delight  as  he  flung  his  glance  around 
to  the  other  two  girls  similarly  breathing. 

The  piano  was  a  miniature  grand  —  a  dainty  thing 
of  rich  white  and  gold  to  match  the  morning  room. 
It  stood  out  from  the  wall,  so  that  there  was  possi 
bility  for  Lute  to  escape  around  either  way  of  it. 
Forrest  gained  his  feet  and  faced  her  across  the 
broad,  flat  top  of  the  instrument.  As  he  threatened 
to  vault  it,  Lute  cried  out  in  horror : 

"  But  your  spurs,  Dick!     Your  spurs!  " 

"  Give  me  time  to  take  them  off,"  he  offered. 

As  he  stooped  to  unbuckle  them,  Lute  darted  to 
escape,  but  was  herded  back  to  the  shelter  of  the 
piano. 

"  All  right,"  he  growled.  "  On  your  head  be  it. 
If  the  piano's  scratched  I'll  tell  Paula." 

"  I've  got  witnesses,"  she  panted,  indicating  with 
her  blue  joyous  eyes  the  young  things  in  the  door 
ways. 

"  Very  well,  my  dear."  Forrest  drew  back  his 
body  and  spread  his  resting  palms.  :<  I'm  coming 
over  to  you." 

Action  and  speech  were  simultaneous.  His  body, 
posited  sidewise  from  his  hands,  was  vaulted  across, 
the  perilous  spurs  a  full  foot  above  the  glossy  white 
surface.  And  simultaneously  Lute  ducked  and  went 
under  the  piano  on  hands  and  knees.  Her  mis 
chance  lay  in  that  she  bumped  her  head,  and,  before 
she  could  recover  way,  Forrest  had  circled  the  piano 
and  cornered  her  under  it. 

"  Come  out!  "  he  commanded.  "  Come  out  and 
take  your  medicine !  " 


32  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  A  truce,"  she  pleaded.  "  A  truce,  Sir  Knight, 
for  dear  love's  sake  and  all  damsels  in  distress." 

"  I  ain't  no  knight,"  Forrest  announced  in  his 
deepest  bass.  ;<  I'm  an  ogre,  a  filthy,  debased  and 
altogether  unregenerate  ogre.  I  was  born  in  the 
tule-swamps.  My  father  was  .  an  ogre  and  my 
mother  was  more  so.  I  was  lulled  to  slumber  on 
the  squalls  of  infants  dead,  foreordained,  and  pre- 
damned.  I  was  nourished  solely  on  the  blood  of 
maidens  educated  in  Mills  Seminary.  My  favorite 
chophouse  has  ever  been  a  hardwood  floor,  a  loaf 
of  Mills  Seminary  maiden,  and  a  roof  of  flat  piano. 
My  father,  as  well  as  an  ogre,  was  a  California 
horse-thief.  I  am  more  reprehensible  than  my 
father.  I  have  more  teeth.  My  mother,  as  well  as 
an  ogress,  was  a  Nevada  book-canvasser.  Let  all 
her  shame  be  told.  She  even  solicited  subscriptions 
for  ladies'  magazines.  I  am  more  terrible  than  my 
mother.  I  have  peddled  safety  razors." 

"  Can  naught  soothe  and  charm  your  savage 
breast?"  Lute  pleaded  in  soulful  tones  while  she 
studied  her  chances  for  escape. 

"  One  thing  only,  miserable  female.  One  thing 
only,  on  the  earth,  over  the  earth,  and  under  its  ruin 
ing  waters — " 

A  squawk  of  recognized  plagiarism  interrupted 
him  from  Ernestine. 

"  See  Ernest  Dowson,  page  seventy-nine,  a  thin 
book  of  thin  verse  ladled  out  with  porridge  to  young 
women  detentioned  at  Mills  Seminary,"  Forrest  went 
on.  "  As  I  had  already  enunciated  before  I  was  so 
rudely  interrupted,  the  one  thing  only  that  can  balm 
and  embalm  this  savage  breast  is  the  '  Maiden's 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  33 

Prayer.'  Listen,  with  all  your  ears  ere  I  chew  them 
off  in  multitude  and  gross!  Listen,  silly,  unbeauti- 
ful,  squat,  short-legged  and  ugly  female  under  the 
piano  !  Can  you  recite  the  '  Maiden's  Prayer  '  ?  " 

Screams  of  delight  from  the  young  things  in  the 
doorways  prevented  the  proper  answer  and  Lute, 
from  under  the  piano,  cried  put  to  young  Wain- 
wright,  who  had  appeared  : 

"  A  rescue,  Sir  Knight !     A  rescue !  " 

"  Unhand  the  maiden !  "  was  Bert's  challenge. 

"  Who  art  thou?  "  Forrest  demanded. 

"  King  George,  sirrah !  —  I  mean,  er,  Saint 
George." 

"  Then  am  I  thy  dragon,"  Forrest  announced  with 
due  humility.  "  Spare  this  ancient,  honorable,  and 
only  neck  I  have." 

"Off  with  his  head!"  the  young  things  encour 
aged. 

"  Stay  thee,  maidens,  I  pray  thee,"  Bert  begged. 
"  I  am  only  a  Small  Potato.  Yet  am  I  unafraid.  I 
shall  beard  the  dragon.  I  shall  beard  him  in  his 
gullet,  and,  while  he  lingeringly  chokes  to  death  over 
my  unpalatableness  and  general  spinefulness,  do  you, 
fair  damsels,  flee  to  the  mountains  lest  the  valleys 
fall  upon  you.  Yolo,  Petaluma,  and  West  Sacra 
mento  are  about  to  be  overwhelmed  by  a  tidal  wave 
and  many  big  fishes." 

u  Off  with  his  head!  "  the  young  things  chanted. 
"  Slay  him  in  his  blood  and  barbecue  him !  " 

"  Thumbs  down,"  Forrest  groaned.  "  I  am  un 
done.  Trust  to  the  unstrained  quality  of  mercy  pos 
sessed  by  Christian  young  women  in  the  year  1914 
who  will  vote  some  day  if  ever  they  grow  up  and  do 


34  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

not  marry  foreigners.  Consider  my  head  off,  Saint 
George.  I  am  expired.  Further  deponent  sayeth 
not." 

And  Forrest,  with  sobs  and  slubbcrings,  with  real 
istic  shudders  and  kicks  and  a  great  jingling  of  spurs, 
lay  down  on  the  floor  and  expired. 

Lute  crawled  out  from  under  the  piano,  and  was 
joined  by  Rita  and  Ernestine  in  an  extemporized 
dance  of  the  harpies  about  the  slain. 

In  the  midst  of  it,  Forrest  sat  up,  protesting. 
Also,  he  was  guilty  of  a  significant  and  privy  wink  to 
Lute. 

4  The    hero ! "    he    cried.     "  Forget    him    not. 
Crown  him  with  flowers." 

And  Bert  was  crowned  with  flowers  from  the 
vases,  unchanged  from  the  day  before.  When  a 
bunch  of  water-logged  stems  of  early  tulips,  pro 
pelled  by  Lute's  vigorous  arm,  impacted  soggily  on 
his  neck  under  the  ear,  he  fled.  The  riot  of  pursuit 
echoed  along  the  hall  and  died  out  down  the  stairway 
toward  the  stag  room.  Forrest  gathered  himself  to 
gether,  and,  grinning,  went  jingling  on  through  the 
Big  House. 

He  crossed  two  patios  on  brick  walks  roofed  with 
Spanish  tile  and  swamped  with  early  foliage  and 
blooms,  and  gained  his  wing  of  the  house,  still 
breathing  from  the  fun,  to  find,  in  the  office,  his  secre 
tary  awaiting  him. 

"  Good  morning,  Mr.  Blake,"  he  greeted.  "  Sorry 
I  was  delayed."  He  glanced  at  his  wrist-watch. 
"  Only  four  minutes,  however.  I  just  couldn't  get 
away  sooner." 


CHAPTER  IV 

FROM  nine  till  ten  Forrest  gave  himself  up  to 
his  secretary,  achieving  a  correspondence  that 
included  learned  societies  and  every  sort  of 
breeding  and  agricultural  organization  and  that 
would  have  compelled  the  average  petty  business 
man,  unaided,  to  sit  up  till  midnight  to  accomplish. 

For  Dick  Forrest  was  the  center  of  a  system  which 
he  himself  had  built  and  of  which  he  was  secretly 
very  proud.  Important  letters  and  documents  he 
signed  with  his  ragged  fist.  All  other  letters  were 
rubber-stamped  by  Mr.  Blake,  who,  also,  in  short 
hand,  in  the  course  of  the  hour,  put  down  the  indi 
cated  answers  to  many  letters  and  received  the  for 
mula  designations  of  reply  to  many  other  letters. 
Mr.  Blake's  private  opinion  was  that  he  worked 
longer  hours  than  his  employer,  although  it  was 
equally  his  private  opinion  that  his  employer  was  a 
wonder  for  discovering  work  for  others  to  perform. 

At  ten,  to  the  stroke  of  the  clock,  as  Pittman,  For 
rest's  show-manager,  entered  the  office,  Blake,  bur 
dened  with  trays  of  correspondence,  sheafs  of  docu 
ments,  and  phonograph  cylinders,  faded  away  to  his 
own  office. 

From  ten  to  eleven  a  stream  of  managers  and 
foremen  flowed  in  and  out.  All  were  well  disci 
plined  in  terseness  and  time-saving.  As  Dick  For 
rest  had  taught  them,  the  minutes  spent  with  him 
were  not  minutes  of  cogitation.  They  must  be  pre- 
35 


36  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

pared  before  they  reported  or  suggested.  Bon- 
bright,  the  assistant  secretary,  always  arrived  at  ten 
to  replace  Blake;  and  Bonbright,  close  to  shoulder, 
with  flying  pencil,  took  down  the  rapid-fire  inter 
change  of  question  and  answer,  statement  and  pro 
posal  and  plan.  These  shorthand  notes,  transcribed 
and  typed  in  duplicate,  were  the  nightmare  and,  on 
occasion,  the  Nemesis,  of  the  managers  and  foremen. 
For,  first,  Forrest  had  a  remarkable  memory;  and, 
second,  he  was  prone  to  prove  its  worth  by  reference 
to  those  same  notes  of  Bonbright. 

A  manager,  at  the  end  of  a  five  or  ten  minute  ses 
sion,  often  emerged  sweating,  limp  and  frazzled. 
Yet  for  a  swift  hour,  at  high  tension,  Forrest  met 
all  comers,  with  a  master's  grip  handling  them  and 
all  the  multifarious  details  of  their  various  depart 
ments.  He  told  Thompson,  the  machinist,  in  four 
flashing  minutes,  where  the  fault  lay  in  the  dynamo 
to  the  Big  House  refrigerator,  laid  the  fault  home  to 
Thompson,  dictated  a  note  to  Bonbright,  with  cita 
tion  by  page  and  chapter  to  a  volume  from  the  li 
brary  to  be  drawn  by  Thompson,  told  Thompson 
that  Parkman,  the  dairy  manager,  was  not  satisfied 
with  the  latest  wiring  up  of  milking  machines,  and 
that  the  refrigerating  plant  at  the  slaughter  house 
was  balking  at  its  accustomed  load. 

Each  man  was  a  specialist,  yet  Forrest  was  the 
proved  master  of  their  specialties.  As  Paulson,  the 
head  plowman,  complained  privily  to  Dawson,  the 
crop  manager:  "I've  worked  here  twelve  years 
and  never  have  I  seen  him  put  his  hands  to  a  plow, 
and  yet,  damn  him,  he  somehow  seems  to  know. 
He's  a  genius,  that's  what  he  is.  Why,  d'ye  know, 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  37 

I've  seen  him  tear  by  a  piece  of  work,  his  hands  full 
with  that  Man-Eater  of  his  a-threatenin'  sudden  fu 
neral,  an',  next  morning,  had  'm  mention  casually  to 
a  half-inch  how  deep  it  was  plowed  an'  what  plows'd 
done  the  plowin' !  —  Take  that  plowin'  of  the 
Poppy  Meadow,  up  above  Little  Meadow,  on  Los 
Cuatos.  I  just  couldn't  see  my  way  to  it,  an'  had  to 
cut  out  the  cross-sub-soiling,  'an'  thought  I  could  slip  it 
over  on  him.  After  it  was  all  finished  he  kind  of 
happened  up  that  way  —  I  was  lookin'  an'  he  didn't 
seem  to  look  —  an',  well,  next  A.M.  I  got  mine  in 
the  office.  No ;  I  didn't  slip  it  over.  I  ain't  tried  to 
slip  nothing  over  since." 

At  eleven  sharp,  Wardman,  his  sheep  manager, 
departed  with  an  engagement  scheduled  at  eleven: 
thirty  to  ride  in  the  machine  along  with  Thayer,  the 
Idaho  buyer,  to  look  over  the  Shropshire  rams.  At 
eleven,  Bonbright  having  departed  with  Wardman 
to  work  up  his  notes,  Forrest  was  left  alone  in  the 
office.  From  a  wire  tray  of  unfinished  business - 
one  of  many  wire  trays  superimposed  in  groups  of 
five  —  he  drew  a  pamphlet  issued  by  the  State  of 
Iowa  on  hog  cholera  and  proceeded  to  scan  it. 

Five  feet,  ten  inches  in  height,  weighing  a  clean- 
muscled  one  hundred  and  eighty  pounds,  Dick  For 
rest  was  anything  but  insignificant  for  a  forty  years1 
old  man.  The  eyes  were  gray,  large,  over-arched  by 
bone  of  brow,  and  lashes  and  brows  were  dark. 
The  hair,  above  an  ordinary  forehead,  was  light 
brown  to  chestnut.  Under  the  forehead,  the  cheeks 
showed  high-boned,  with  underneath  the  slight  hol 
lows  that  necessarily  accompany  such  formation. 
The  jaws  were  strong  without  massiveness,  the  nose, 


38  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

large-nostriled,  was  straight  enough  and  prominent 
enough  without  being  too  straight  or  prominent,  the 
chin  square  without  harshness  and  uncleft,  and  the 
mouth  girlish  and  sweet  to  a  degree  that  did  not  hide 
the  firmness  to  which  the  lips  could  set  on  due  provo 
cation.  The  skin  was  smooth  and  well-tanned,  al 
though,  midway  between  eyebrows  and  hair,  the  tan 
of  forehead  faded  in  advertisement  of  the  rim  of 
the  Baden  Powell  interposed  between  him  and  the 
sun. 

Laughter  lurked  in  the  mouth  corners  and  eye- 
corners,  and  there  were  cheek  lines  about  the  mouth 
that  would  seem  to  have  been  formed  by  laughter. 
Equally  strong,  however,  every  line  of  the  face  that 
meant  blended  things  carried  a  notice  of  surety. 
Dick  Forrest  was  sure  —  sure,  when  his  hand 
reached  out  for  any  object  on  his  desk,  that  the  hand 
would  straightly  attain  the  object  without  a  fumble 
or  a  miss  of  a  fraction  of  an  inch;  sure,  when  his 
brain  leaped  the  high  places  of  the  hog  cholera  text, 
that  it  was  not  missing  a  point;  sure,  from  his  bal 
anced  body  in  the  revolving  desk-chair  to  the  bal 
anced  back-head  of  him;  sure,  in  heart  and  brain, 
of  life  and  work,  of  all  he  possessed,  and  of  him 
self. 

He  had  reason  to  be  sure.  Body,  brain,  and 
career  were  long-proven  sure.  A  rich  man's  son,  he 
had  not  played  ducks  and  drakes  with  his  father's 
money.  City  born  and  reared,  he  had  gone  back  to 
the  land  and  made  such  a  success  as  to  put  his  name 
on  the  lips  of  breeders  wherever  breeders  met  and 
talked.  He  was  the  owner,  without  encumbrance, 
of  two  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  acres  of  land  — 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  39 

land  that  varied  in  value  from  a  thousand  dollars  an 
acre  to  a  hundred  dollars,  that  varied  from  a  hun 
dred  dollars  to  ten  cents  an  acre,  and  that,  in 
stretches,  was  not  worth  a  penny  an  acre.  The  im 
provements  on  that  quarter  of  a  million  acres,  from 
drain-tiled  meadows  to  dredge-drained  tule  swamps, 
from  good  roads  to  developed  water-rights,  from 
farm  buildings  to  the  Big  House  itself,  constituted  a 
sum  gaspingly  ungraspable  to  the  country-side. 

Everything  was  large-scale  but  modern  to  the  last 
tick  of  the  clock.  His  managers  lived,  rent-free, 
with  salaries  commensurate  to  ability,  in  five-  and  ten- 
thousand-dollar  houses  —  but  they  were  the  cream 
of  specialists  skimmed  from  the  continent  from  the 
Atlantic  to  the  Pacific.  When  he  ordered  gasoline- 
tractors  for  the  cultivation  of  the  flat  lands,  he  or 
dered  a  round  score.  When  he  dammed  water  in 
his  mountains  he  dammed  it  by  the  hundreds  of  mil 
lions  of  gallons.  When  he  ditched  his  tule-swamps, 
instead  of  contracting  the  excavation,  he  bought  the 
huge  dredgers  outright,  and,  when  there  was  slack 
work  on  his  own  marshes,  he  contracted  for  the 
draining  of  the  marshes  of  neighboring  big  farmers, 
land  companies,  and  corporations  for  a  hundred 
miles  up  and  down  the  Sacramento  River. 

He  had  brain  sufficient  to  know  the  need  of  buying 
brains  and  to  pay  a  tidy  bit  over  the  current  market 
price  for  the  most  capable  brains.  And  he  had 
brain  sufficient  to  direct  the  brains  he  bought  to  a 
profitable  conclusion. 

And  yet,  he  was  just  turned  forty^  was  clear-eyed, 
calm-hearted,  hearty-pulsed,  man-strong;  and  yet,  his 
history,  until  he  was  thirty,  had  been  harum-scarum 


40  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

and  erratic  to  the  superlative.  He  had  run  away 
from  a  millionaire  home  when  he  was  thirteen.  He 
had  won  enviable  college  honors  ere  he  was  twenty- 
one  and  after  that  he  had  known  all  the  purple  ports 
of  the  purple  seas,  and,  with  cool  head,  hot  heart, 
and  laughter,  played  every  risk  that  promised  and 
provided  in  the  wild  world  of  adventure  that  he  had 
lived  to  see  pass  under  the  sobriety  of  law. 

In  the  old  days  of  San  Francisco  Forrest  had  been 
a  name  to  conjure  with.  The  Forrest  Mansion  had 
been  one  of  the  pioneer  palaces  on  Nob  Hill  where 
dwelt  the  Floods,  the  Mackays,  the  Crockers,  and 
the  O'Briens.  "  Lucky "  Richard  Forrest,  the 
father,  had  arrived,  via  the  Isthmus,  straight  from 
old  New  England,  keenly  commercial,  interested  be 
fore  his  departure  in  clipper  ships  and  the  building 
of  clipper  ships,  and  interested  immediately  after  his 
arrival  in  water-front  real  estate,  river  steamboats, 
mines,  of  course,  and,  later,  in  the  draining  of  the 
Nevada  Comstock  and  the  construction  of  the  South 
ern  Pacific. 

He  played  big,  he  won  big,  he  lost  big;  but  he  won 
always  more  than  he  lost,  and  what  he  paid  out  at 
one  game  with  one  hand,  he  drew  back  with  his  other 
hand  at  another  game.  His  winnings  from  the 
Comstock  he  sank  into  the  various  holes  of  the  bot 
tomless  Daffodil  Group  in  Eldorado  County.  The 
wreckage  from  the  Benicia  Line  he  turned  into  the 
Napa  Consolidated,  which  was  a  quicksilver  venture, 
and  it  earned  him  five  thousand  per  cent.  What  he 
lost  in  the  collapse  of  the  Stockton  boom  was  more 
than  balanced  by  the  realty  appreciation  of  his  key- 
holdings  at  Sacramento  and  Oakland. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  41 

And,  to  cap  it  all,  when  "  Lucky  "  Richard  For 
rest  had  lost  everything  in  a  series  of  calamities,  so 
that  San  Francisco  debated  what  price  his  Nob  Hill 
palace  would  fetch  at  auction,  he  grubstaked  one, 
Del  Nelson,  to  a  prospecting  in  Mexico.  As  soberly 
set  down  in  history,  the  result  of  the  said  Del  Nel 
son's  search  for  quartz  was  the  Harvest  Group,  in 
cluding  the  fabulous  and  inexhaustible  Tattlesnake, 
Voice,  City,  Desdemona,  Bullfrog,  and  Yellow  Boy 
claims.  Del  Nelson,  astounded  by  his  achievement, 
within  the  year  drowned  himself  in  an  enormous 
quantity  of  cheap  whisky,  and,  the  will  being  incon- 
testible  through  lack  of  kith  and  kin,  left  his  half  to 
Lucky  Richard  Forrest. 

Dick  Forrest  was  the  son  of  his  father.  Lucky 
Richard,  a  man  of  boundless  energy  and  enterprise, 
though  twice  married  and  twice  widowed,  had  not 
been  blessed  with  children.  His  third  marriage  oc 
curred  in  1872,  when  he  was  fifty-eight,  and  in  1874, 
although  he  lost  the  mother,  a  twelve-pound  boy, 
stout-barreled  and  husky-lunged,  remained  to  be 
brought  up  by  a  regiment  of  nurses  in  the  palace  on 
Nob  Hill. 

Young  Dick  was  precocious.  Lucky  Richard  was 
a  democrat.  Result:  Young  Dick  learned  in  a 
year  from  a  private  teacher  what  would  have  re 
quired  three  years  in  the  grammar  school,  and  used 
all  of  the  saved  years  in  playing  in  the  open  air. 
Also,  result  of  precocity  of  son  and  democracy  of 
father,  Young  Dick  was  sent  to  grammar  school  for 
the  last  year  in  order  to  learn  shoulder-rubbing 
democracy  with  the  sons  and  daughters  of  workmen, 
tradesmen,  saloon-keepers  and  politicians. 


42  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

In  class  recitation  or  spelling  match  his  father's 
millions  did  not  aid  him  in  competing  with  Patsy  Hal- 
loran,  the  mathematical  prodigy  whose  father  was  a 
hod-carrier,  nor  with  Mona  Sanguinetti  who  was  a 
wizard  at  spelling  and  whose  widowed  mother  ran  a 
vegetable  store.  Nor  were  his  father's  millions  and 
the  Nob  Hill  palace  of  the  slightest  assistance  to 
Young  Dick  when  he  peeled  his  jacket  and,  bare- 
knuckled,  without  rounds,  licking  or  being  licked, 
milled  it  to  a  finish  with  Jimmy  Botts,  Jean  Choy- 
insky,  and  the  rest  of  the  lads  that  went  out  over  the 
world  to  glory  and  cash  a  few  years  later,  a  genera 
tion  of  prizefighters  that  only  San  Francisco,  raw  and 
virile  and  yeasty  and  young,  could  have  produced. 

The  wisest  thing  Lucky  Richard  did  for  his  boy 
was  to  give  him  this  democratic  tutelage.  In  his 
secret  heart,  Young  Dick  never  forgot  that  he  lived 
in  a  palace  of  many  servants  and  that  his  father  was 
a  man  of  power  and  honor.  On  the  other  hand, 
Young  Dick  learned  two-legged,  two-fisted  democ 
racy.  He  learned  it  when  Mona  Sanguinetti  spelled 
him  down  in  class.  He  learned  it  when  Berney  Mil 
ler  out-dodged  and  out-ran  him  when  running  across 
in  Black  Man. 

And  when  Tim  Hagan,  with  straight  left  for  the 
hundredth  time  to  bleeding  nose  and  mangled  mouth, 
and  with  ever  reiterant  right  hook  to  stomach,  had 
him  dazed  and  reeling,  the  breath  whistling  and 
sobbing  through  his  lacerated  lips  —  was  no  time  for 
succor  from  palaces  and  bank  accounts.  On  his  two 
legs,  with  his  two  fists,  it  was  either  he  or  Tim. 
And  it  was  right  there,  in  sweat  and  blood  and  iron 
of  soul,  that  Young  Dick  learned  how  not  to  lose  a 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  43 

losing  fight.  It  had  been  uphill  from  the  first  blow, 
but  he  stuck  it  out  until  in  the  end  it  was  agreed  that 
neither  could  best  the  other,  although  this  agreement 
was  not  reached  until  they  had  first  lain  on  the  ground 
in  nausea  and  exhaustion  and  with  streaming  eyes 
wept  their  rage  and  defiance  at  each  other.  After 
that,  they  became  chums  and  between  them  ruled  the 
schoolyard. 

Lucky  Richard  died  the  same  month  Young  Dick 
emerged  from  grammar  school.  Young  Dick  was 
thirteen  years  old,  with  twenty  million  dollars,  and 
without  a  relative  in  the  world  to  trouble  him.  He 
was  the  master  of  a  palace  of  servants,  a  steam 
yacht,  stables,  and,  as  well,  of  a  summer  palace  down 
the  Peninsula  in  the  nabob  colony  at  Menlo.  One 
thing,  only,  was  he  burdened  with :  guardians. 

On  a  summer  afternoon,  in  the  big  library,  he  at 
tended  the  first  session  of  his  board  of  guardians. 
There  were  three  of  them,  all  elderly,  and  successful, 
all  legal,  all  business  comrades  of  his  father.  Dick's 
impression,  as  they  explained  things  to  him,  was  that, 
although  they  meant  well,  he  had  no  contacts  with 
them.  In  his  judgment,  their  boyhood  was  too  far 
behind  them.  Besides  that,  it  was  patent  that  him, 
the  particular  boy  they  were  so  much  concerned  with, 
they  did  not  understand  at  all.  Furthermore,  in  his 
own  sure  way  he  decided  that  he  was  the  one  person 
in  the  world  fitted  to  know  what  was  best  for  him 
self. 

Mr.  Crockett  made  a  long  speech,  to  which  Dick 
listened  with  alert  and  becoming  attention,  nodding 
his  head  whenever  he  was  directly  addressed  or  ap 
pealed  to.  Messrs.  Davidson  and  Slocum  also  had 


44  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

their  say  and  were  treated  with  equal  consideration. 
Among  other  things,  Dick  learned  what  a  sterling, 
upright  man  his  father  had  been,  and  the  program 
already  decided  upon  by  the  three  gentlemen  which 
would  make  him  into  a  sterling  and  upright  man. 

When  they  were  quite  done,  Dick  took  it  upon  him 
self  to  say  a  few  things. 

"  I  have  thought  it  over,"  he  announced,  "  and 
first  of  all  I  shall  go  traveling." 

'*  That  will  come  afterward,  my  boy,"  Mr. 
Slocum  explained  soothingly.  "  When  —  say  — 
when  you  are  ready  to  enter  the  university.  At  that 
time  a  year  abroad  would  be  a  very  good  thing  .  .  . 
a  very  good  thing  indeed." 

u  Of  course,"  Mr.  Davidson  volunteered  quickly, 
having  noted  the  annoyed  light  in  the  lad's  eyes  and 
the  unconscious  firm-drawing  and  setting  of  the  lips, 
u  of  course,  in  the  meantime  you  could  do  some 
traveling,  a  limited  amount  of  traveling,  during  your 
school  vacations.  I  am  sure  my  fellow  guardians 
will  agree  —  under  the  proper  management  and 
safeguarding,  of  course  —  that  such  bits  of  travel 
sandwiched  between  your  school-terms,  would  be  ad 
visable  and  beneficial." 

"How  much  did  you  say  I  am  worth?"  Dick 
asked  with  apparent  irrelevance. 

1  Twenty  millions  —  at  a  most  conservative  esti 
mate —  that  is  about  the  sum,"  Mr.  Crockett  an 
swered  promptly. 

"  Suppose  I  said  right  now  that  I  wanted  a  hun 
dred  dollars !  "  Dick  went  on. 

u  Why  —  er  —  ahem."  Mr.  Slocum  looked 
about  him  for  guidance. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  45 

"  We  would  be  compelled  to  ask  what  you  wanted 
it  for,"  answered  Mr.  Crockett. 

"  And  suppose,"  Dick  said  very  slowly,  looking 
Mr.  Crockett  squarely  in  the  eyes,  "  suppose  I  said 
that  I  was  very  sorry,  but  that  I  did  not  care  to  say 
what  I  wanted  it  for?  " 

u  Then  you  wouldn't  get  it,"  Mr.  Crockett  said 
so  immediately  that  there  was  a  hint  of  testiness  and 
snap  in  his  manner. 

Dick  nodded  slowly,  as  if  letting  the  information 
sink  in. 

u  But,  of  course,  my  boy,"  Mr.  Slocum  took  up 
hastily,  "  you  understand  you  are  too  young  to  handle 
money  yet.  We  must  decide  that  for  you." 

"  You  mean  I  can't  touch  a  penny  without  your 
permission?  " 

"  Not  a  penny,"  Mr.  Crockett  snapped. 

Dick  nodded  his  head  thoughtfully  and  murmured, 
"  Oh,  I  see." 

"  Of  course,  and  quite  naturally,  it  would  only  be 
fair,  you  know,  you  will  have  a  small  allowance  for 
your  personal  spending,"  Mr.  Davidson  said. 
"  Say,  a  dollar,  or,  perhaps,  two  dollars,  a  week.  As 
you  grow  older  this  allowance  will  be  increased. 
And  by  the  time  you  are  twenty-one,  doubtlessly  you 
will  be  fully  qualified  —  with  advice,  of  course  —  to 
handle  your  own  affairs." 

"  And  until  I  am  twenty-one  my  twenty  million 
wouldn't  buy  me  a  hundred  dollars  to  do  as  I  please 
with?  "  Dick  queried  very  subduedly. 

Mr.  Davidson  started  to  corroborate  in  soothing 
phrases,  but  was  waved  to  silence  by  Dick,  who  con 
tinued: 


46  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  As  I  understand  it,  whatever  money  I  handle 
will  be  by  agreement  between  the  four  of  us  ?  " 

The  Board  of  Guardians  nodded. 

"  That  rs,  whatever  we  agree,  goes?  " 

Again  the  Board  of  Guardians  nodded. 

"  Well,  I'd  like  to  have  a  hundred  right  now," 
Dick  announced. 

'  What  for?  "  Mr.  Crockett  demanded. 

"  I  don't  mind  telling  you,"  was  the  lad's  steady 
answer.  u  To  go  traveling." 

"You'll  go  to  bed  at  eight  .-thirty  this  evening," 
Mr.  Crockett  retorted.  "  And  you  don't  get  any 
hundred.  The  lady  we  spoke  to  you  about  will  be 
here  before  six.  She  is  to  have,  as  we  explained, 
daily  and  hourly  charge  of  you.  At  six-thirty,  as 
usual,  you  will  dine,  and  she  will  dine  with  you  and 
see  you  to  bed.  As  we  told  you,  she  will  have  to 
serve  the  place  of  a  mother  to  you  —  see  that  your 
ears  are  clean,  your  neck  washed — " 

"  And  that  I  get  my  Saturday  night  bath,"  Dick 
amplified  meekly  for  him. 

11  Precisely." 

"  How  much  are  you  —  am  I  —  paying  the  lady 
for  her  services?"  Dick  questioned  in  the  discon 
certing,  tangential  way  that  was  already  habitual  to 
him,  as  his  school  companions  and  teachers  had 
learned  to  their  cost. 

Mr.  Crockett  for  the  first  time  cleared  his  throat 
for  pause. 

"  I'm  paying  her,  ain't  I  ?  "  Dick  prodded.  "  Out 
of  the  twenty  million,  you  know." 

"  The  spit  of  his  father,"  said  Mr.  Slocum  in  an 
aside. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  47 

"  Mrs.  Summerstone,  the  lady  as  you  elect  to  call 
her,  receives  one  hundred  and  fifty  a  month,  eighteen 
hundred  a  year  in  round  sum,"  said  Mr.  Crockett. 

"  It's  a  waste  of  perfectly  good  money,"  Dick 
sighed.  "  And  board  and  lodging  thrown  in!  " 

He  stood  up  —  not  the  born  aristocrat  of  the  gen 
erations,  but  the  reared  aristocrat  of  thirteen  years 
in  the  Nob  Hill  palace.  He  stood  up  with  such  a 
manner  that  his  Board  of  Guardians  left  their  leather 
chairs  to  stand  up  with  him.  But  he  stood  up  as  no 
Lord  Fauntleroy  ever  stood  up ;  for  he  was  a  mixer. 
He  had  knowledge  that  human  life  was  many-faced 
and  many-placed.  Not  for  nothing  had  he  been 
spelled  down  by  Mona  Sanguinetti.  Not  for  noth 
ing  had  he  fought  Tim  Hagan  to  a  standstill  and, 
co-equal,  ruled  the  schoolyard  roost  with  him. 

He  was  birthed  of  the  wild  gold-adventure  of 
Forty-nine.  He  was  a  reared  aristocrat  and  a  gram 
mar-school-trained  democrat.  He  knew,  in  his 
precocious  immature  way,  the  differentiations  between 
caste  and  mass;  and,  behind  it  all,  he  was  possessed 
of  a  will  of  his  own  and  of  a  quiet  surety  of  self 
that  was  incomprehensible  to  the  three  elderly  gentle 
men  who  had  been  given  charge  of  his  and  his  destiny 
and  who  had  pledged  themselves  to  increase  his 
twenty  millions  and  make  a  man  of  him  in  their  own 
composite  image. 

"  Thank  you  for  your  kindness,"  Young  Dick 
said  generally  to  the  three.  "  I  guess  we'll  get 
along  all  right.  Of  course,  that  twenty  millions  is 
mine,  and  of  course  you've  got  to  take  care  of  it  for 
me,  seeing  I  know  nothing  of  business  — 

"  And  we'll  increase  it  for  you,  my  boy,  we'll  in- 


48  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

crease  it  for  you  in  safe,  conservative  ways,"  Mr. 
Slocum  assured  him. 

"  No  speculation,"  Young  Dick  warned.  "  Dad's 
just  been  lucky  —  I've  heard  him  say  that  times  have 
changed  and  a  fellow  can't  take  the  chances  every 
body  used  to  take." 

From  which,  and  from  much  which  has  already 
passed,  it  might  erroneously  be  inferred  that  Young 
Dick  was  a  mean  and  money-grubbing  soul.  On 
the  contrary,  he  was  at  that  instant  entertaining 
secret  thoughts  and  plans  so  utterly  regardless  and 
disdainful  of  his  twenty  millions  as  to  place  him  on 
a  par  with  a  drunken  sailor  sowing  the  beach  with 
a  three  years'  pay-day. 

"  I  am  only  a  boy,"  Young  Dick  went  on.  u  But 
you  don't  know  me  very  well  yet.  We'll  get  better 
acquainted  by  and  by,  and,  again  thanking  you  .  .  ." 

He  paused,  bowed  briefly  and  grandly  as  lords  in 
Nob  Hill  palaces  early  learn  to  bow,  and,  by  the 
quality  of  the  pause,  signified  that  the  audience  was 
over.  Nor  did  the  impact  of  dismissal  miss  his 
guardians.  They,  who  had  been  co-lords  with  his 
father,  withdrew  confused  and  perplexed.  Messrs. 
Davidson  and  Slocum  were  on  the  point  of  resolving 
their  perplexity  into  wrath,  as  they  went  down  the 
great  stone  stairway  to  the  waiting  carriage,  but  Mr. 
Crockett,  the  testy  and  snappish,  muttered  ecstatic 
ally:  "The  son  of  a  gun!  The  little  son  of  a 
gun!" 

The  carriage  carried  them  down  to  the  old  Pacific 
Union  Club,  where,  for  another  hour,  they  gravely 
discussed  the  future  of  Young  Dick  Forrest  and 
pledged  themselves  anew  to  the  faith  reposed  in  them 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  49 

by  Lucky  Richard  Forrest.  And  down  the  hill,  on 
foot,  where  grass  grew  on  the  paved  streets  too  steep 
for  horse-traffic,  Young  Dick  hurried.  As  the  height 
of  land  was  left  behind,  almost  immediately  the  pal 
aces  and  spacious  grounds  of  the  nabobs  gave  way 
to  the  mean  streets  and  wooden  warrens  of  the 
working  people.  The  San  Francisco  of  1887  as  m~ 
continently  intermingled  its  slums  and  mansions  as 
did  the  old  cities  of  Europe.  Nob  Hill  arose,  like 
any  medieval  castle,  from  the  mess  and  ruck  of 
common  life  that  denned  and  laired  at  its  base. 

Young  Dick  came  to  pause  alongside  a  corner 
grocery,  the  second  story  of  which  was  rented  to 
Timothy  Hagan  Senior,  who,  by  virtue  of  being  a 
policeman  with  a  wage  of  a  hundred  dollars  a  month, 
rented  this  high  place  to  dwell  above  his  fellows  who 
supported  families  on  no  more  than  forty  and  fifty 
dollars  a  month. 

In  vain  Young  Dick  whistled  up  through  the  un 
screened,  open  windows.  Tim  Hagan  Junior  was 
not  at  home.  But  Young  Dick  wasted  little  wind 
in  the  whistling.  He  was  debating  on  possible  ad 
jacent  places  where  Tim  Hagan  might  be,  when 
Tim  himself  appeared  around  the  corner,  bearing  a 
lidless  lard-can  that  foamed  with  steam  beer.  He 
grunted  greeting,  and  Young  Dick  grunted  with  equal 
roughness,  just  as  if,  a  brief  space  before,  he  had 
not,  in  most  lordly  fashion,  terminated  an  audience 
with  three  of  the  richest  merchant-kings  of  an  im 
perial  city.  Nor  did  his  possession  of  twenty  in 
creasing  millions  hint  the  slightest  betrayal  in  his 
voice  or  mitigate  in  the  slightest  the  gruffness  of  his 
grunt. 


50  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  Ain't  seen  yeh  since  yer  old  man  died,"  Tim 
Hagan  commented. 

;t  Well,  you're  seein'  me  now,  ain't  you  ?  "  was 
Young  Dick's  retort.  "  Say,  Tim,  I  come  to  see  you 
on  business." 

"  Wait  till  I  rush  the  beer  to  the  old  man,"  said 
Tim,  inspecting  the  state  of  the  foam  in  the  lard-can 
with  an  experienced  eye.  "  He'll  roar  his  head  off 
if  it  comes  in  flat." 

"  Oh,  you  can  shake  it  up,"  Young  Dick  assured 
him.  "  Only  want  to  see  you  a  minute.  I'm  hitting 
the  road  to-night.  Want  to  come  along?  " 

Tim's  small,  blue  Irish  eyes  flashed  with  interest. 

1  Where  to?"  he  queried. 

u  Don't  know.  Want  to  come?  If  you  do,  we 
can  talk  it  over  after  we  start?  You  know  the  ropes. 
What  d'ye  say?" 

"  The  old  man'll  beat  the  stuffin'  outa  me,"  Tim 
demurred. 

"  He's  done  that  before,  an'  you  don't  seem  to  be 
much  missing,"  Young  Dick  callously  rejoined. 
"  Say  the  word,  an'  we'll  meet  at  the  Ferry  Building 
at  nine  to-night.  What  d'ye  say?  I'll  be  there." 

"  Supposin'  I  don't  show  up?"  Tim  asked. 

:<  I'll  be  on  my  way  just  the  same."  Young  Dick 
turned  as  if  to  depart,  paused  casually,  and  said  over 
his  shoulder,  "  Better  come  along." 

Tim  shook  up  the  beer  as  he  answered  with  equal 
casualness,  "  Aw  right.  I'll  be  there." 

After  parting  from  Tim  Hagan  Young  Dick  spent 
a  busy  hour  or  so  looking  up  one,  Marcovich,  a  Slav 
onian  schoolmate  whose  father  ran  a  chop-house  in 
which  was  reputed  to  be  served  the  finest  twenty-cent 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  51 

meal  in  the  city.  Young  Marcovich  owed  Young 
Dick  two  dollars,  and  Young  Dick  accepted  the  pay 
ment  of  a  dollar  and  forty  cents  as  full  quittance  of 
the  debt. 

Also,  with  shyness  and  perturbation,  Young  Dick 
wandered  down  Montgomery  Street  and  vacillated 
among  the  many  pawnshops  that  graced  that  thor 
oughfare.  At  last,  diving  desperately  into  one,  he 
managed  to  exchange  for  eight  dollars  and  a  ticket 
his  gold  watch  that  he  knew  was  worth  fifty  at  the 
very  least. 

Dinner  in  the  Nob  Hill  palace  was  served  at  six- 
thirty.  He  arrived  at  six-forty-five  and  encountered 
Mrs.  Summerstone.  She  was  a  stout,  elderly,  de 
cayed  gentlewoman,  a  daughter  of  the  great  Porter- 
Rickington  family  that  had  shaken  the  entire  Pacific 
Coast  with  its  financial  crash  in  the  middle  seventies. 
Despite  her  stoutness,  she  suffered  from  what  she 
called  shattered  nerves. 

"  This  will  never,  never  do,  Richard,"  she  cen 
sured.  "  Here  is  dinner  waiting  fifteen  minutes  al 
ready,  and  you  have  not  yet  washed  your  face  and 
hands." 

"  I  am  sorry,  Mrs.  Summerstone,"  Young  Dick 
apologized.  "  I  won't  keep  you  waiting  ever  again. 
And  I  won't  bother  you  much  ever." 

At  dinner,  in  state,  the  two  of  them  alone  in  the 
great  dining  room,  Young  Dick  strove  to  make  things 
easy  for  the  lady,  whom,  despite  his  knowledge  that 
she  was  on  his  pay-roll,  he  felt  toward  as  a  host  must 
feel  toward  a  guest. 

"  You'll  be  very  comfortable  here,"  he  promised, 
"  once  you  are  settled  down.  It's  a  good  old  house, 


52  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

and  most  of  the  servants  have  been  here  for 
years." 

"  But,  Richard,"  she  smiled  seriously  to  him;  "  it 
is  not  the  servants  who  will  determine  my  happiness 
here.  It  is  you." 

"  I'll  do  my  best,"  he  said  graciously.  "  Better 
than  that.  I'm  sorry  I  came  in  late  for  dinner.  In 
years  and  years  you'll  never  see  me  late  again.  I 
won't  bother  you  at  all.  You'll  see.  It  will  be  just 
as  though  I  wasn't  in  the  house." 

When  he  bade  her  good  night,  on  his  way  to  bed, 
he  added,  as  a  last  thought: 

"  I'll  warn  you  of  one  thing:  Ah  Sing.  He's  the 
cook.  He's  been  in  our  house  for  years  and  years  — 
oh,  I  don't  know,  maybe  twenty-five  or  thirty  years 
he's  cooked  for  father,  from  long  before  this  house 
was  built  or  I  was  born.  He's  privileged.  He's  so 
used  to  having  his  own  way  that  you'll  have  to  handle 
him  with  gloves.  But  once  he  likes  you  he'll  work 
his  fool  head  off  to  please  you.  He  likes  me  that 
way.  You  get  him  to  like  you,  and  you'll  have  the 
time  of  your  life  here.  And,  honest,  I  won't  give 
you  any  trouble  at  all.  It'll  be  a  regular  snap,  just 
as  if  I  wasn't  here  at  all." 


CHAPTER  V 

AT  nine  in  the  evening,  sharp  to  the  second,  clad 
in  his  oldest  clothes,  Young  Dick  met  Tim 
Hagan  at  the  Ferry  Building. 

"  No  use  headin'  north,"  said  Tim.  "  Winter'll 
come  on  up  that  way  and  make  the  sleepin'  crimpy. 
D'ye  want  to  go  East  —  that  means  Nevada  and  the 
deserts." 

"Any  other  way?"  queried  Young  Dick. 
"  What's  the  matter  with  south  ?  We  can  head  for 
Los  Angeles,  an'  Arizona,  an'  New  Mexico  —  oh, 
an'  Texas." 

"  How  much  money  you  got?  "  Tim  demanded. 

"What  for?"  Young  Dick  countered. 

'  We  gotta  get  out  quick,  an'  payin'  our  way  at 
the  start  is  quickest.  Me  —  I'm  all  hunkydory;  but 
you  ain't.  The  folks  that's  lookin'  after  you'll  raise 
a  roar.  They'll  have  more  detectives  out  than  you 
can  shake  at  stick  at.  We  gotta  dodge  'em,  that's 
what." 

"  Then  we  will  dodge,"  said  Young  Dick. 
"  We'll  make  short  jumps  this  way  and  that  for 
a  couple  of  days,  layin'  low  most  of  the  time,  paying 
our  way,  until  we  can  get  to  Tracy.  Then  we'll  quit 
payin'  an'  beat  her  south." 

All  of  which  program  was  carefully  carried  out. 
They  eventually  went  through  Tracy  as  pay  pas 
sengers,  six  hours  after  the  local  deputy  sheriff  had 

S3 


54  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

given  up  his  task  of  searching  the  trains.  With  an 
excess  of  precaution  Young  Dick  paid  beyond  Tracy 
and  as  far  as  Modesto.  After  that,  under  the  teach 
ing  of  Tim,  he  traveled  without  paying,  riding  blind 
baggage,  box  cars,  and  cow-catchers.  Young  Dick 
bought  the  newspapers,  and  frightened  Tim  by  read 
ing  to  him  the  lurid  accounts  of  the  kidnapping  of  the 
young  heir  to  the  Forrest  millions. 

Back  in  San  Francisco  the  Board  of  Guardians  of 
fered  rewards  that  totaled  thirty  thousand  dollars 
for  the  recovery  of  their  ward.  And  Tim  Hagan, 
reading  the  same  while  they  lay  in  the  grass  by  some 
water-tank,  branded  forever  the  mind  of  Young  Dick 
with  the  fact  that  honor  beyond  price  was  a  matter 
of  neither  place  nor  caste  and  might  outcrop  in  the 
palace  on  the  height  of  land  or  in  the  dwelling  over 
a  grocery  down  on  the  flat. 

"  Gee  1  "  Tim  said  to  the  general  landscape. 
"  The  old  man  wouldn't  raise  a  roar  if  I  snitched  on 
you  for  that  thirty  thousand.  It  makes  me  scared  to 
think  of  it." 

And  from  the  fact  that  Tim  thus  openly  mentioned 
the  matter,  Young  Dick  concluded  that  there  was  no 
possibility  of  the  policeman's  son  betraying  him. 

Not  until  six  weeks  afterward,  in  Arizona,  did 
Young  Dick  bring  up  the  subject. 

"  You  see,  Tim,"  he  said,  "  I've  got  slathers  of 
money.  It's  growing  all  the  time,  and  I  ain't  spend 
ing  a  cent  of  it,  not  so  as  you  can  notice  .  .  .  though 
that  Mrs.  Summerstone  is  getting  a  cold  eighteen 
hundred  a  year  out  of  me,  with  board  and  carriages 
thrown  in,  while  you  an'  I  are  glad  to  get  the  leav 
ings  of  firemen's  pails  in  the  round-houses.  Just  the 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  55 

same,  my  money's  growing.  What's  ten  per  cent, 
on  twenty  dollars?  " 

Tim  Hagan  stared  at  the  shimmering  heat-waves 
of  the  desert  and  tried  to  solve  the  problem. 

"  What's  one-tenth  of  twenty  million?"  Young 
Dick  demanded  irritably. 

"  Huh !  —  two  million,  of  course." 

"  Well,  five  per  cent.'s  half  of  ten  per  cent.  What 
does  twenty  million  earn  at  five  per  cent,  for  one 
year?" 

Tim  hesitated. 

"  Half  of  it,  half  of  two  million!  "  Young  Dick 
cried.  "  At  that  rate  I'm  a  million  richer  every  year. 
Get  that,  and  hang  on  to  it,  and  listen  to  me.  When 
I'm  good  and  willing  to  go  back  —  but  not  for  years 
an'  years  —  we'll  fix  it  up,  you  and  I.  When  I  say 
the  word,  you'll  write  to  your  father.  He'll  jump 
out  to  where  we  are  waiting,  pick  me  up,  and  cart  me 
back.  Then  he'll  collect  the  thirty  thousand  reward 
from  my  guardians,  quit  the  police  force,  and  most 
likely  start  a  saloon." 

4  Thirty  thousand's  a  hell  of  a  lot  of  money," 
was  Tim's  nonchalant  way  of  expressing  his  gratitude. 

"  Not  to  me,"  Young  Dick  minimized  his  gen 
erosity.  '  Thirty  thousand  goes  into  a  million 
thirty-three  times,  and  a  million's  only  a  year's  turn 
over  of  my  money." 

But  Tim  Hagan  never  lived  to  see  his  father  a 
saloon  keeper.  Two  days  later,  on  a  trestle,  the 
lads  were  fired  out  of  an  empty  box-car  by  a  brake- 
man  who  should  have  known  better.  The  trestle 
spanned  a  dry  ravine.  Young  Dick  looked  down  at 
the  rocks  seventy  feet  below  and  demurred. 


56  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"There's  room  on  the  trestle,"  he  said;  "  but 
what  if  the  train  starts  up?  " 

"  It  ain't  goin'  to  start  —  beat  it  while  you  got 
time,"  the  brakeman  insisted.  "  The  engine's  takin' 
water  at  the  other  side.  She  always  takes  it 
here." 

But  for  once  the  engine  did  not  take  water.  The 
evidence  at  the  inquest  developed  that  the  engineer 
had  found  no  water  in  the  tank  and  started  on. 
Scarcely  had  the  two  boys  dropped  from  the  side- 
door  of  the  box-car,  and  before  they  had  made  a 
score  of  steps  along  the  narrow  way  between  the  train 
and  the  abyss,  than  the  train  began  to  move.  Young 
Dick,  quick  and  sure  in  all  his  perceptions  and  adjust 
ments,  dropped  on  the  instant  to  hands  and  knees  on 
the  trestle.  This  gave  him  better  holding  and  more 
space,  because  he  crouched  beneath  the  overhang  of 
the  box-cars.  Tim,  not  so  quick  in  perceiving  and 
adjusting,  also  overcome  with  Celtic  rage  at  the 
brakeman,  instead  of  dropping  to  hands  and  knees, 
remained  upright  to  flare  his  opinion  of  the  brake 
man,  to  the  brakeman,  in  lurid  and  ancestral  terms. 

"  Get  down !  —  drop  !  "  Young  Dick  shouted. 

But  the  opportunity  had  passed.  On  a  down 
grade,  the  engine  picked  up  the  train  rapidly.  Fac 
ing  the  moving  cars,  with  empty  air  at  his  back  and 
the  depth  beneath,  Tim  tried  to  drop  on  hands  and 
knees.  But  the  first  twist  of  his  shoulders  brought 
him  in  contact  with  the  car  and  nearly  out-balanced 
him.  By  a  miracle  he  recovered  equilibrium.  But 
he  stood  upright.  The  train  was  moving  faster  and 
faster.  It  was  impossible  to  get  down. 

Young  Dick,  kneeling  and  holding,  watched.     The 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  57 

train  gathered  way.  The  cars  moved  more  swiftly. 
Tim,  with  a  cool  head,  his  back  to  the  fall,  his  face 
to  the  passing  cars,  his  arms  by  his  sides,  with  no 
where  save  under  his  feet  a  holding  point,  balanced 
and  swayed.  The  faster  the  train  moved,  the  wider 
he  swayed,  until,  exerting  his  will,  he  controlled  him 
self  and  ceased  from  swaying. 

And  all  would  have  been  well  with  him,  had  it  not 
been  for  one  car.  Young  Dick  knew  it,  and  saw  it 
coming.  It  was  a  "  palace  horse-car,"  projecting  six 
inches  wider  than  any  car  on  the  train.  He  saw  Tim 
see  it  coming.  He  saw  Tim  steel  himself  to  meet 
the  abrupt  subtraction  of  half  a  foot  from  the  nar 
row  space  wherein  he  balanced.  He  saw  Tim 
slowly  and  deliberately  sway  out,  sway  out  to  the 
extremest  limit,  and  yet  not  sway  out  far  enough. 
The  thing  was  physically  inevitable.  An  inch  more, 
and  Tim  would  have  escaped  the  car.  An  inch  more 
and  he  would  have  fallen  without  impact  from  the 
car.  It  caught  him,  in  that  margin  of  an  inch,  and 
hurled  him  backward  and  side-twisting.  Twice  he 
whirled  sidewise,  and  two  and  a  half  times  he  turned 
over,  ere  he  struck  on  his  head  and  neck  on  the 
rocks. 

He  never  moved  after  he  struck.  The  seventy- 
foot  fall  broke  his  neck  and  crushed  his  skull.  And 
right  there  Young  Dick  learned  death  —  not  the  or 
dered,  decent  death  of  civilization,  wherein  doctors 
and  nurses  and  hypodermics  ease  the  stricken  one  into 
the  darkness,  and  ceremony  and  function  and  flowers 
and  undertaking  institutions  conspire  to  give  a  happy 
leave-taking  and  send-off  to  the  departing  shade,  but 
sudden  death,  primitive  death,  ugly  and  ungarnished, 


5  8  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

like  the  death  of  a  steer  in  the  shambles  or  a  fat 
swine  stuck  in  the  jugular. 

And  right  there  Young  Dick  learned  more  —  the 
mischance  of  life  and  fate;  the  universe  hostile  to 
man ;  the  need  to  perceive  and  to  act,  to  see  and  know, 
to  be  sure  and  quick,  to  adjust  instantly  to  all  instant 
shiftage  of  the  balance  of  forces  that  bear  upon  the 
living.  And  right  there,  beside  the  strangely  crum 
pled  and  shrunken  remnant  of  what  had  been  his  com 
rade  the  moment  before,  Young  Dick  learned  that 
illusion  must  be  discounted,  and  that  reality  never 
lied. 

In  New  Mexico,  Young  Dick  drifted  into  the 
Jingle-bob  Ranch,  north  of  Roswell,  in  the  Pecos 
Valley.  He  was  not  yet  fourteen,  and  he  was  ac 
cepted  as  the  mascot  of  the  ranch  and  made  into  a 
"  sure-enough  "  cowboy  by  cowboys  who,  on  legal 
papers,  legally  signed  names  such  as  Wild  Horse, 
Willie  Buck,  Boomer  Deacon,  and  High  Pockets. 

Here,  during  a  stay  of  six  months,  Young  Dick, 
soft  of  frame  and  unbreakable,  achieved  a  knowl 
edge  of  horses  and  horsemanship,  and  of  men  in  the 
rough  and  raw,  that  became  a  life  asset.  More  he 
learned.  There  was  John  Chisum,  owner  of  the 
Jingle-bob,  the  Bosque  Grande,  and  of  other  cattle 
ranches  as  far  away  as  the  Black  River  and  beyond. 
John  Chisum  was  a  cattle  king  who  had  foreseen  the 
coming  of  the  farmer  and  adjusted  from  the  open 
range  to  barbed  wire,  and  who,  in  order  to  do  so, 
had  purchased  every  forty  acres  carrying  water  and 
got  for  nothing  the  use  of  the  millions  of  acres  of 
adjacent  range  that  was  worthless  without  the  water 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  59 

he  controlled.  And  in  the  talk  by  the  camp-fire  and 
chuck  wagon,  among  forty-dollar-a-month  cowboys 
who  had  not  foreseen  what  John  Chisum  foresaw, 
Young  Dick  learned  precisely  why  and  how  John 
Chisum  had  become  a  cattle  king  while  a  thousand 
of  his  contemporaries  worked  for  him  on  wages. 

But  Young  Dick  was  no  cool-head.  His  blood 
was  hot.  He  had  passion,  and  fire,  and  male  pride. 
Ready  to  cry  from  twenty  hours  in  the  saddle,  he 
learned  to  ignore  the  thousand  aching  creaks  in  his 
body  and  with  the  stoic  brag  of  silence  to  withstrain 
from  his  blankets  until  the  hard-bitten  punchers  led 
the  way.  By  the  same  token  he  straddled  the  horse 
that  was  apportioned  him,  insisted  on  riding  night- 
herd,  and  knew  no  hint  of  uncertainty  when  it  came 
to  him  to  turn  the  flank  of  a  stampede  with  a  flying 
slicker.  He  could  take  a  chance.  It  was  his  joy 
to  take  a  chance.  But  at  such  times  he  never  failed 
of  due  respect  for  reality.  He  was  well  aware  that 
men  were  soft-shelled  and  cracked  easily  on  hard 
rocks  or  under  pounding  hoofs.  And  when  he  re 
jected  a  mount  that  tangled  its  legs  in  quick  action 
and  stumbled,  it  was  not  because  he  feared  to  be 
cracked,  but  because,  when  he  took  a  chance  on  being 
cracked,  he  wanted,  as  he  told  John  Chisum  himself, 
"  an  even  break  for  his  money/' 

It  was  while  at  the  Jingle-bob,  but  mailed  by  a  cat 
tleman  from  Chicago,  that  Young  Dick  wrote  a  let 
ter  to  his  guardians.  Even  then,  so  careful  was  he, 
that  the  envelope  was  addressed  to  Ah  Sing. 
Though  unburdened  by  his  twenty  millions,  Young 
Dick  never  forgot  them,  and,  fearing  his  estate  might 
be  distributed  among  remote  relatives  who  might 


60  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

possibly  inhabit  New  England,  he  warned  his  guard 
ians  that  he  was  still  alive  and  that  he  would  return 
home  in  several  years.  Also,  he  ordered  them  to 
keep  Mrs.  Summerstone  on  at  her  regular  salary. 

But  Young  Dick's  feet  itched.  Half  a  year,  he 
felt,  was  really  more  than  he  should  have  spent  at 
the  Jingle-bob.  As  a  boy  hobo,  or  road-kid,  he 
drifted  on  across  the  United  States,  getting  ac 
quainted  with  its  peace  officers,  police  judges,  vag 
rancy  laws,  and  jails.  And  he  learned  vagrants 
themselves  at  first  hand,  and  floating  laborers  and 
petty  criminals.  Among  other  things,  he  got  ac 
quainted  with  farms  and  farmers,  and,  in  New  York 
State,  once  picked  berries  for  a  week  with  a  Dutch 
farmer  who  was  experimenting  with  one  of  the  first 
silos  erected  in  the  United  States.  Nothing  of  what 
he  learned  came  to  him  in  the  spirit  of  research.  He 
had  merely  the  human  boy's  curiosity  about  all 
things,  and  he  gained  merely  a  huge  mass  of  data 
concerning  human  nature  and  social  conditions  that 
was  to  stand  him  in  good  stead  in  later  years,  when, 
with  the  aid  of  the  books,  he  digested  and  classified 
it. 

His  adventures  did  not  harm  him.     Even  when 
he  consorted  with  jail-birds   in  jungle   camps,   and 
listened  to  their  codes  of  conduct  and  measurements 
/of  life,  he  was  not  affected.     He  was  a  traveler,  and 
/  they  were  alien  breeds.     Secure  in  the  knowledge  of 
/    his  twenty  millions,  there  was  neither  need  nor  temp 
tation  for  him  to  steal  or  rob.     All  things  and  all 
places  interested  him,  but  he  never  found  a  place 
nor  a  situation  that  could  hold  him.     He  wanted  to 
see,  to  see  more  and  more,  and  to  go  on  seeing. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  61 

At  the  end  of  three  years,  nearly  sixteen,  hard  of 
body,  weighing  a  hundred  and  thirty  pounds,  he 
judged  it  time  to  go  home  and  open  the  books.  So 
he  took  his  first  long  voyage,  signing  on  as  boy  on  a 
windjammer  bound  around  the  Horn  from  the  Dela 
ware  Breakwater  to  San  Francisco.  It  was  a  hard 
voyage,  of  one  hundred  and  eighty  days,  but  at  the 
end  he  weighed  ten  pounds  the  more  for  having 
made  it. 

Mrs.  Summerstone  screamed  when  he  walked  in  on 
her,  and  Ah  Sing  had  to  be  called  from  the  kitchen  to 
identify  him.  Mrs.  Summerstone  screamed  a  second 
time.  It  was  when  she  shook  hands  with  him  and 
lacerated  her  tender  skin  in  the  fisty  grip  of  his  rope- 
calloused  palms. 

He  was  shy,  almost  embarrassed,  as  he  greeted  his 
guardians  at  the  hastily  summoned  meeting.  But 
this  did  not  prevent  him  from  talking  straight  to  the 
point. 

"  It's  this  way,"  he  said.  "  I  am  not  a  fool.  I 
know  what  I  want,  and  I  want  what  I  want.  I  am 
alone  in  the  world,  outside  of  good  friends  like  you, 
of  course,  and  I  have  my  own  ideas  of  the  world  and 
what  I  want  to  do  in  it.  I  didn't  come  home  be 
cause  of  a  sense  of  duty  to  anybody  here.  I  came 
home  because  it  was  time,  because  of  my  sense  of  duty 
to  myself.  I'm  all  the  better  from  my  three  years 
of  wandering  about,  and  now  it's  up  to  me  to  go  on 
with  my  education  —  my  book  education,  I  mean." 
'  The  Belmont  Academy,"  Mr.  Slocum  suggested. 
"  That  will  fit  you  for  the  university  — " 

Dick  shook  his  head  decidedly. 

"  And  take  three  years  to  do  it.     So  would  a  high 


62  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

school.  I  intend  to  be  in  the  University  of  Cali 
fornia  inside  one  year.  That  means  work.  But  my 
mind's  like  acid.  It'll  bite  into  the  books.  I  shall 
hire  a  coach,  or  half  a  dozen  of  them,  and  go  to  it. 
And  I'll  hire  my  coaches  myself  —  hire  and  fire 
them.  And  that  means  money  to  handle." 

"  A  hundred  a  month,"  Mr.  Crockett  suggested. 

Dick  shook  his  head. 

"  I've  taken  care  of  myself  for  three  years  without 
any  of  my  money.  I  guess  I  can  take  care  of  myself 
along  with  some  of  my  money  here  in  San  Francisco. 
I  don't  care  to  handle  my  business  affairs  yet,  but  I 
do  want  a  bank  account,  a  respectable-sized  one.  I 
want  to  spend  it  as  I  see  fit,  for  what  I  see  fit." 

The  guardians  looked  their  dismay  at  one  another. 

"  It's  ridiculous,  impossible,"  Mr.  Crockett  began. 
"  You  are  as  unreasonable  as  you  were  before  you 
went  away." 

"  It's  my  way,  I  guess,"  Dick  sighed.  "  The  other 
disagreement  was  over  my  money.  It  was  a  hun 
dred  dollars  I  wanted  then." 

"  Think  of  our  position,  Dick,"  Mr.  Davidson 
urged.  "  As  your  guardians,  how  would  it  be  looked 
upon  if  we  gave  you,  a  lad  of  sixteen,  a  free  hand 
with  money." 

"  What's  the  Freda  worth,  right  now?  "  Dick  de 
manded  irrelevantly. 

"  Can  sell  for  twenty  thousand  any  time,"  Mr. 
Crockett  answered. 

"  Then  sell  her.  She's  too  large  for  me,  and  she's 
worth  less  every  year.  I  want  a  thirty-footer  that  I 
can  handle  myself  for  knocking  around  the  Bay,  and 
that  won't  cost  a  thousand.  Sell  the  Freda  and  put 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  63 

the  money  to  my  account.  Now  what  you  three  are 
afraid  of  is  that  I'll  misspend  my  money  —  taking  to 
drinking,  horse-racing,  and  running  around  with 
chorus  girls.  Here's  my  proposition  to  make  you 
easy  on  that :  let  it  be  a  drawing  account  for  the  four 
of  us.  The  moment  any  of  you  decide  I  am  mis 
spending,  that  moment  you  can  draw  out  the  total 
balance.  I  may  as  well  tell  you,  that  just  as  a  side 
line  I'm  going  to  get  a  business  college  expert  to 
come  here  and  cram  me  with  the  mechanical  side  of 
the  business  game." 

Dick  did  not  wait  for  their  acquiescence,  but  went 
on  as  from  a  matter  definitely  settled. 

u  How  about  the  horses  down  at  Menlo  ?  —  never 
mind,  I'll  look  them  over  and  decide  what  to  keep. 
Mrs.  Summerstone  will  stay  on  here  in  charge  of  the 
house,  because  I've  got  too  much  work  mapped  out 
for  myself  already.  I  promise  you  you  won't  regret 
giving  me  a  free  hand  with  my  directly  personal  af 
fairs.  And  now,  if  you  want  to  hear  about  the  last 
three  years,  I'll  spin  the  yarn  for  you." 

• 

Dick  Forrest  had  been  right  when  he  told  his 
guardians  that  his  mind  was  acid  and  would  bite  into 
the  books.  Never  was  there  such  an  education,  and 
he  directed  it  himself  —  but  not  without  advice.  He 
had  learned  the  trick  of  hiring  brains  from  his  father 
and  from  John  Chisum  of  the  Jingle-bob.  He  had 
learned  to  sit  silent  and  to  think  while  cow  men  talked 
long  about  the  campfire  and  the  chuck  wagon.  And, 
by  virtue  of  name  and  place,  he  sought  and  obtained 
interviews  with  professors  and  college  presidents  and 
practical  men  of  affairs;  and  he  listened  to  their  talk 


64  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

through  many  hours,  scarcely  speaking,  rarely  asking 
a  question,  merely  listening  to  the  best  they  had  to 
offer,  content  to  receive  from  several  such  hours  one 
idea,  one  fact,  that  would  help  him  to  decide  what 
sort  of  an  education  he  would  go  in  for  and  how. 

Then  came  the  engaging  of  coaches.  Never  was 
there  such  an  engaging  and  discharging,  such  a  hiring 
and  firing.  He  was  not  frugal  in  the  matter.  For 
one  that  he  retained  a  month,  or  three  months,  he 
discharged  a  dozen  on  the  first  day,  or  the  first  week. 
And  invariably  he  paid  such  dischargees  a  full  month 
although  their  attempts  to  teach  him  might  not  have 
consumed  an  hour.  He  did  such  things  fairly  and 
grandly,  because  he  could  afford  to  be  fair  and  grand. 

He,  who  had  eaten  the  leavings  from  firemen's 
pails  in  round-houses  and  "  scoffed  "  mulligan-stews 
at  water-tanks,  had  learned  thoroughly  the  worth  of 
money.  He  bought  the  best  with  the  sure  knowl 
edge  that  it  was  the  cheapest.  A  year  of  high  school 
physics  and  a  year  of  high  school  chemistry  were 
necessary  to  enter  the  university.  When  he  had 
crammed  his  algebra  and  geometry,  he  sought  out  the 
heads  of  the  physics  and  chemistry  departments  in  the 
University  of  California.  Professor  Carey  laughed 
at  him  ...  at  the  first. 

"  My  dear  boy,"  Professor  Carey  began. 

Dick  waited  patiently  till  he  was  through.  Then 
Dick  began,  and  concluded. 

"  I'm  not  a  fool,  Professor  Carey.  High  school 
and  academy  students  are  children.  They  don't 
know  the  world.  They  don't  know  what  they  want, 
or  why  they  want  what  is  ladled  out  to  them.  I  know 
the  world.  I  know  what  I  want  and  why  I  want  it. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  65 

They  do  physics  for  an  hour,  twice  a  week,  for  two 
terms,  which,  with  two  vacations,  occupy  one  year. 
You  are  the  top  teacher  on  the  Pacific  Coast  in  phys 
ics.  The  college  year  is  just  ending.  In  the  first 
week  of  your  vacation,  giving  every  minute  of  your 
time  to  me,  I  can  get  the  year's  physics.  What  is 
that  week  worth  to  you?  " 

u  You  couldn't  buy  it  for  a  thousand  dollars,"  Pro 
fessor  Carey  rejoined,  thinking  he  had  settled  the 
matter. 

"  I  know  what  your  salary  is  — "  Dick  began. 

"What  is  it?"  Professor  Carey  demanded 
sharply. 

"  It's  not  a  thousand  a  week,"  Dick  retorted  as 
sharply.  :t  It's  not  five  hundred  a  week,  nor  two- 
fifty  a  week — "  He  held  up  his  hand  to  stall  off 
interruption.  *  You've  just  told  me  I  couldn't  buy 
a  week  of  your  time  for  a  thousand  dollars.  I'm 
not  going  to.  But  I  am  going  to  buy  that  week  for 
two  thousand.  Heavens !  —  I've  only  got  so  many 
years  to  live  — " 

"And  you  can  buy  years?"  Professor  Carey 
queried  slyly. 

"  Sure.  That's  why  I'm  here.  I  buy  three  years 
in  one,  and  the  week  from  you  is  part  of  the  deal." 

"  But  I  have  not  accepted,"  Professor  Carey 
laughed. 

"  If  the  sum  is  not  sufficient,"  Dick  said  stiffly, 
"  why  name  the  sum  you  consider  fair." 

And  Professor  Carey  surrendered.  So  did  Pro 
fessor  Barsdale,  head  of  the  department  of  chem 
istry. 

Already  had  Dick  taken  his  coaches  in  mathe- 


66  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

matics  duck  hunting  for  weeks  in  the  sloughs  of  the 
Sacramento  and  the  San  Joaquin.  After  his  bout 
with  physics  and  chemistry  he  took  his  two  coaches 
in  literature  and  history  into  the  Curry  County  hunt 
ing  region  of  southwestern  Oregon.  He  had 
learned  the  trick  from  his  father,  and  he  worked, 
and  played,  lived  in  the  open  air,  and  did  three  con 
ventional  years  of  adolescent  education  in  one  year 
without  straining  himself.  He  fished,  hunted,  swam, 
exercised,  and  equipped  himself  for  the  university  at 
the  same  time.  And  he  made  no  mistake.  He  knew 
that  he  did  it  because  his  father's  twenty  millions 
had  invested  him  with  mastery.  Money  was  a  tool. 
He  did  not  over-rate  it,  nor  under-rate  it.  He  used 
it  to  buy  what  he  wanted. 

"  The  weirdest  form  of  dissipation  I  ever  heard," 
said  Mr.  Crockett,  holding  up  Dick's  account  for  the 
year.  "  Sixteen  thousand  for  education,  all  item 
ized,  including  railroad  fares,  porters'  tips,  and  shot 
gun  cartridges  for  his  teachers." 

"  He  passed  the  examinations  just  the  same," 
quoth  Mr.  Slocum. 

"  And  in  a  year,"  growled  Mr.  Davidson.  "  My 
daughter's  boy  entered  Belmont  at  the  same  time, 
and,  if  he's  lucky,  it  will  be  two  years  yet  before  he 
enters  the  university." 

"  Well,  all  I've  got  to  say,"  proclaimed  Mr. 
Crockett,  "  is  that  from  now  on  what  that  boy  says 
in  the  matter  of  spending  his  money  goes." 

"  And  now  I'll  have  a  snap,"  Dick  told  his  guard 
ians.  "  Here  I  am,  neck  and  neck  again,  and  years 
ahead  of  them  in  knowledge  of  the  world.  Why,  I 
know  things,  good  and  bad,  big  and  little,  about  men 


OF  THE     lG  HOUSE  67 

and  women  and  life  that  sometimes  I  almost  doubt 
myself  that  they're  true.     But  I  know  them. 

"  From  now  on,  I'm  not  going  to  rush.  I've 
caught  up,  and  I'm  going  through  regular.  All  I 
have  to  do  is  to  keep  the  speed  of  the  classes,  and 
I'll  be  graduated  when  I'm  twenty-one.  From  now 
on  I'll  need  less  money  for  education  —  no  more 
coaches,  you  know  —  and  more  money  for  a  good 


time." 


Mr.  Davidson  was  suspicious. 

"  What  do  you  mean  by  a  good  time?  " 

"  Oh,  I'm  going  in  for  the  frats,  for  football,  hold 
my  own,  you  know  —  and  I'm  interested  in  gasoline 
engines.  I'm  going  to  build  the  first  ocean-going 
gasoline  yacht  in  the  world  — " 

"You'll  blow  yourself  up,"  Mr.  Crockett  de 
murred.  "  It's  a  fool  notion  all  these  cranks  are 
rushing  into  over  gasoline." 

"  I'll  make  myself  safe,"  Dick  answered,  "  and 
that  means  experimenting,  and  it  means  money,  so 
keep  me  a  good  drawing  account  —  same  old  way  - 
all  four  of  us  can  draw." 


CHAPTER  VI 

DICK  FORREST  proved  himself  no  prodigy 
at  the  university,  save  that  he  cut  more  lec 
tures  the  first  year  than  any  other  student. 
The  reason  for  this  was  that  he  did  not  need  the 
lectures  he  cut,  and  he  knew  it.  His  coaches,  while 
preparing  him  for  the  entrance  examinations,  had  car 
ried  him  nearly  through  the  first  college  year.  Inci 
dentally,  he  made  the  Freshman  team,  a  very  scrub 
team,  that  was  beaten  by  every  high  school  and  acad 
emy  it  played  against. 

But  Dick  did  put  in  work  that  nobody  saw.  His 
collateral  reading  was  wide  and  deep,  and  when  he 
went  on  his  first  summer  cruise  in  the  ocean-going 
gasoline  yacht  he  had  built  no  gay  young  crowd  ac 
companied  him.  Instead,  his  guests,  with  their  fami 
lies,  were  professors  of  literature,  history,  juris 
prudence,  and  philosophy.  It  was  long  remembered 
in  the  university  as  the  "  high-brow  "  cruise.  The 
professors,  on  their  return,  reported  a  most  enjoyable 
time.  Dick  returned  with  a  greater  comprehension 
of  the  general  fields  of  the  particular  professors  than 
he  could  have  gained  in  years  at  their  class-lectures. 
And  time  thus  gained,  enabled  him  to  continue  to  cut 
lectures  and  to  devote  more  time  to  laboratory  work. 

Nor  did  he  miss  having  his  good  college  time. 
College  widows  made  love  to  him,  and  college  girls 

68 


THE  LITTLE  LADY  69 

loved  him,  and  he  was  indefatigable  in  his  dancing. 
He  never  cut  a  smoker,  a  beer  bust,  or  a  rush,  and  he 
toured  the  Pacific  Coast  with  the  Banjo  and  Mando 
lin  Club. 

And  yet  he  was  no  prodigy.  He  was  brilliant 
at  nothing.  Half  a  dozen  of  his  fellows  could  out- 
banjo  and  out-mandolin  him.  A  dozen  fellows  were 
adjudged  better  dancers  than  he.  In  football,  and  he 
gained  the  Varsity  in  his  Sophomore  year,  he  was 
considered  a  solid  and  dependable  player,  and  that 
was  all.  It  seemed  never  his  luck  to  take  the  ball 
and  go  down  the  length  of  the  field  while  the  Blue  and 
Gold  host  tore  itself  and  the  grandstand  to  pieces. 
But  it  was  at  the  end  of  heart-breaking,  grueling  slog 
in  mud  and  rain,  the  score  tied,  the  second  half  im 
minent  to  its  close,  Stanford  on  the  five-yard  line, 
Berkeley's  ball,  with  two  downs  and  three  yards  to 
gain  —  it  was  then  that  the  Blue  and  Gold  arose  and 
chanted  its  demand  for  Forrest  to  hit  the  center  and 
hit  it  hard. 

He  never  achieved  super-excellence  at  anything. 
Big  Charley  Everson  drank  him  down  at  the  beer 
busts.  Harrison  Jackson,  at  hammer-throwing,  al 
ways  exceeded  his  best  by  twenty  feet.  Carruthers 
out-pointed  him  at  boxing.  Anson  Burge  could  al 
ways  put  his  shoulders  to  the  mat,  two  out  of  three, 
but  always  only  by  the  hardest  work.  In  English 
composition  a  fifth  of  his  class  excelled  him.  Edlin, 
the  Russian  Jew,  out-debated  him  on  the  contention 
that  property  was  robbery.  Schultz  and  Debret  left 
him  with  the  class  behind  in  higher  mathematics ;  and 
Otsuki,  the  Japanese,  was  beyond  all  comparison  with 
him  in  chemistry. 


70  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

But  if  Dick  Forrest  did  not  excel  at  anything,  he 
failed  in  nothing.  He  displayed  no  superlative 
strength,  he  betrayed  no  weakness  nor  deficiency.  As 
he  told  his  guardians,  who,  by  his  unrelenting  good 
conduct  had  been  led  into  dreaming  some  great  career 
for  him;  as  he  told  them,  when  they  asked  what  he 
wanted  to  become: 

"  Nothing.     Just  all  around.     You  see,  I  don't 
have  to  be  a  specialist.     My  father  arranged  that  for 
me  when  he  left  me  his  money.     Besides,  I  couldn't 
be  X  specialist  if  I  wanted  to.     It  isn't  me." 
/And  thus  so  well-keyed  was  he,  that  he  expressed 
^clearly  his  key.     He  had  no  flare  for  anything.     He 
/was  that  rare  individual,  normal,  average,  balanced, 
all-around. 

When  Mr.  Davidson,  in  the  presence  of  his  fellow 
guardians,  stated  his  pleasure  in  that  Dick  had  shown 
no  wildness  since  he  had  settled  down,  Dick  replied : 

"  Oh,  I  can  hold  myself  when  I  want  to." 

"  Yes,"  said  Mr.  Slocum  gravely.  "  It's  the  finest 
thing  in  the  world  that  you  sowed  your  wild  oats 
early  and  learned  control." 

Dick  looked  at  him  curiously. 

"  Why,  that  boyish  adventure  doesn't  count,"  he 
said.  "  That  wasn't  wildness.  I  haven't  gone  wild 
yet.  But  watch  me  when  I  start.  Do  you  know 
Kipling's  *  Song  of  Diego  Valdez'  ?  Let  me  quote 
you  a  bit  of  it.  You  see,  Diego  Valdez,  like  me, 
had  good  fortune.  He  rose  so  fast  to  be  High  Ad 
miral  of  Spain  that  he  found  no  time  to  take  the 
pleasure  he  had  merely  tasted.  He  was  lusty  and 
husky,  but  he  had  no  time,  being  too  busy  rising. 
But  always,  he  thought,  he  fooled  himself  with  the 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  71 

thought,  that  his  lustiness  and  huskiness  would  last, 
and,  after  he  became  High  Admiral  he  could  then 
have  his  pleasure.  Always  he  remembered: 

"  ' —  comrades  — 

Old  playmates  on  new  seas  — 
When  as  we  traded  orpiment 

Among  the  savages  — 
•     A  thousand  leagues  to  south'ard 
And  thirty  years  removed  — 
They  knew  not  noble  Valdez, 
But  me  they  knew  and  loved. 

"  '  Then  they  that  found  good  liquor 

They  drank  it  not  alone, 
And  they  that  found  fair  plunder, 

They  told  us  every  one, 
Behind  our  chosen  islands 

Or  secret  shoals  between, 
When,  walty  from  far  voyage, 

We  gathered  to  careen. 

*  There  burned  our  breaming-fagots, 

All  pale  along  the  shore: 
There  rose  our  worn  pavilions  — 

A  sail  above  an  oar: 
As  flashed  each  yearning  anchor 

Through  mellow  seas  afire, 
So  swift  our  careless  captains 

Rowed  each  to  his  desire. 

"  '  Where  lay  our  loosened  harness? 

Where  turned  our  naked  feet? 
Whose  tavern  mid  the  palm-trees? 

What  quenchings  of  what  heat? 
Oh  fountain  in  the  desert! 

Oh  cistern  in  the  waste! 
Oh  bread  we  ate  in  secret ! 

Oh  cup  we  spilled  in  haste ! 


THE  LITTLE  LADY 

c  The  youth  new-taught  of  longing, 

The  widow  curbed  and  wan  — 
The  goodwife  proud  at  season, 

And  the  maid  aware  of  man; 
All  souls,  unslaked,  consuming, 

Defrauded  in  delays, 
Desire  not  more  than  quittance 

Than  I  those  forfeit  days! ' 

"  Oh,  get  him,  get  him,  you  three  oldsters,  as  IVe 
got  him!  Get  what  he  says  next: 

: '  I  dreamed  to  wait  my  pleasure, 

Unchanged  my  spring  would  bide : 
Wherefore,  to  wait  my  pleasure, 

I  put  my  spring  aside, 
Till,  first  in  face  of  Fortune, 

And  last  in  mazed  disdain, 
I  made  Diego  Valdez 

High  Admiral  of  Spain !  ' 

"Listen  to  me,  guardians!"  Dick  cried  on,  his 
face  a  flame  of  passion.  "  Don't  forget  for  one 
moment  that  I  am  anything  but  unslaked,  consuming. 
I  am.  I  burn.  But  I  hold  myself.  Don't  think 
I  am  a  dead  one  because  I  am  a  darn  nice,  meritori 
ous  boy  at  college.  I  am  young.  I  am  alive.  I 
am  all  lusty  and  husky.  But  I  make  no  mistake. 
I  hold  myself.  I  don't  start  out  now  to  blow  up  on 
the  first  lap.  I  am  just  getting  ready.  I  am  going 
to  have  my  time.  I  am  not  going  to  spill  my  cup  in 
haste.  ^Vnd  in  the  end  I  am  not  going  to  lament  as 
Diego  Valdez  did: 

'  There  walks  no  wind  'neath  heaven 

Nor  wave  that  shall  restore 
The  old  careening  riot 

And  the  clamorous,  crowded  shore  — 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  73 

The  fountain  in  the  desert, 

The  cistern  in  the  waste, 
The  bread  we  ate  in  secret, 

The  cup  we  spilled  in  haste.' 

"  Listen,  guardians !  Do  you  know  what  it  is  to 
hit  your  man,  to  hit  him  in  hot  blood  —  square  to  the 
jaw  —  and  drop  him  cold?  I  want  that.  And  I 
want  to  love,  and  kiss,  and  risk,  and  play  the  lusty, 
husky  fool.  I  want  to  take  my  chance.  I  want  my 
careening  riot,  and  I  want  it  while  I  am  young,  but 
not  while  I  am  too  young.  And  I'm  going  to  have 
it.  And  in  the  meantime  I  play  the  game  at  college, 
I  hold  myself,  I  equip  myself,  so  that  when  I  turn 
loose  I  am  going  to  have  the  best  chance  of  my  best. 
Oh,  believe  me,  I  do  not  always  sleep  well  of  nights." 

"  You  mean?  "  queried  Mr.  Crockett. 

"  Sure.  That's  just  what  I  mean.  I  haven't 
gone  wild  yet,  but  just  watch  me  when  I  start." 

"  And  you  will  start  when  you  graduate?  " 

The  remarkable  youngster  shook  his  head. 

"  After  I  graduate  I'm  going  to  take  at  least  a 
year  of  post-graduate  courses  in  the  College  of  Ag 
riculture.  You  see,  I'm  developing  a  hobby  —  farm 
ing.  I  want  to  do  something  .  .  .  something  con 
structive.  My  father  wasn't  constructive  to  amount 
to  anything.  Neither  were  you  fellows.  You  struck 
a  new  land  in  pioneer  days,  and  you  picked  up  money 
like  a  lot  of  sailors  shaking  out  nuggets  from  the 
grass  roots  in  a  virgin  placer  - 

"  My  lad,  I've  some  little  experience  in  Cali- 
fornian  farming,"  Mr.  Crockett  interrupted  in  a  hurt 
way. 

"  Sure   you   have,   but  you  weren't   constructive. 


74  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

You  were  —  well,  facts  are  facts  —  you  were  de 
structive.  You  were  a  bonanza  farmer.  What  did 
you  do  ?  You  took  forty  thousand  acres  of  the  finest 
Sacramento  Valley  soil  and  you  grew  wheat  on  it 
year  after  year.  You  never  dreamed  of  rotation. 
You  burned  your  straw.  You  exhausted  your  hu 
mus.  You  plowed  four  inches  and  put  a  plow-sole 
like  a  cement  sidewalk  just  four  inches  under  the 
surface.  You  exhausted  that  film  of  four  inches  and 
now  you  can't  get  your  seed  back. 

4  You've  destroyed.  That's  what  my  father  did. 
They  all  did  it.  Well,  Fm  going  to  take  my  father's 
money  and  construct.  I'm  going  to  take  worked-out 
wheat-land  that  I  can  buy  as  at  a  fire-sale,  rip  out  the 
plow-sole,  and  make  it  produce  more  in  the  end  than 
it  did  when  you  fellows  first  farmed  it." 

It  was  at  the  end  of  his  Junior  year  that  Mr. 
Crockett  again  mentioned  Dick's  threatened  period 
of  wildness. 

"  Soon  as  I'm  done  with  cow  college,"  was  his 
answer.  "  Then  I'm  going  to  buy,  and  stock,  and 
start  a  ranch  that'll  be  a  ranch.  And  then  I'll  set  out 
after  my  careening  riot." 

"  About  how  large  a  ranch  will  you  start  with?  " 
Mr.  Davidson  asked. 

"  Maybe  fifty  thousand  acres,  maybe  five  hundred 
thousand.  It  all  depends.  I'm  going  to  play  un 
earned  increment  to  the  limit.  People  haven't  be 
gun  to  come  to  California  yet.  Without  a  tap  of  my 
hand  or  a  turn  over,  fifteen  years  from  now  land  that 
I  can  buy  for  ten  dollars  an  acre  will  be  worth  fifty, 
and  what  I  can  buy  for  fifty  will  be  worth  five  hun 
dred." 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  75 

"  A  half  million  acres  at  ten  dollars  an  acre  means 
five  million  dollars,"  Mr.  Crockett  warned  gravely. 

"  And  at  fifty  it  means  twenty-five  million,"  Dick 
laughed. 

But  his  guardians  never  believed  in  the  wild  oats 
pilgrimage  he  threatened.  He  might  waste  his  for 
tune  on  new-fangled  farming,  but  to  go  literally  wild 
after  such  years  of  self-restraint  was  an  unthinkable 
thing. 

Dick  took  his  sheepskin  with  small  honor.  He 
was  twenty-eighth  in  his  class,  and  he  had  not  set  the 
college  world  afire.  His  most  notable  achievement 
had  been  his  resistance  and  bafflement  of  many  nice 
girls  and  of  the  mothers  of  many  nice  girls.  Next, 
after  that,  he  had  signalized  his  Senior  year  by  cap 
taining  the  Varsity  to  its  first  victory  over  Stanford 
in  five  years.  It  was  in  the  day  prior  to  large- 
salaried  football  coaches,  when  individual  play  meant 
much;  but  he  hammered  team-work  and  the  sacrifice 
of  the  individual  into  his  team,  so  that  on  Thanksgiv 
ing  Day,  over  a  vastly  more  brilliant  eleven,  the 
Blue  and  Gold  was  able  to  serpentine  its  triumph 
down  Market  Street  in  San  Francisco. 

In  his  post-graduate  year  in  cow  college,  Dick  de 
voted  himself  to  laboratory  work  and  cut  all  lectures. 
In  fact,  he  hired  his  own  lecturers,  and  spent  a  siz 
able  fortune  on  them  in  mere  traveling  expenses  over 
California.  Jacques  Ribot,  esteemed  one  of  the 
greatest  world  authorities  on  agricultural  chemistry, 
who  had  been  seduced  from  his  two  thousand  a  year 
in  France  by  the  six  thousand  offered  by  the  Uni 
versity  of  California,  who  had  been  seduced  to  Ha 
waii  by  the  ten  thousand  of  the  sugar  planters,  Dick 


76  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

Forrest  seduced  with  fifteen  thousand  and  the  more 
delectable  temperate  climate  of  California  on  a  five 
years'  contract. 

Messrs.  Crockett,  Slocum,  and  Davidson  threw  up 
their  hands  in  horror  and  knew  that  this  was  the 
wild  career  Dick  Forrest  had  forecast. 

But  this  was  only  one  of  Dick  Forrest's  similar  dis 
sipations.  He  stole  from  the  Federal  Government, 
at  a  prodigal  increase  of  salary,  its  star  specialist 
in  livestock  breeding,  and  by  similar  misconduct  he 
robbed  the  University  of  Nebraska  of  its  greatest 
milch  cow  professor,  and  broke  the  heart  of  the  Dean 
of  the  College  of  Agriculture  of  the  University  of 
California  by  appropriating  Professor  Nirdenham- 
mer,  the  wizard  of  farm  management. 

"  Cheap  at  the  price,  cheap  at  the  price,"  Dick 

explained  to  his  guardians.     "  Wouldn't  you  rather 

see  me  spend  my  money  in  buying  professors  than  in 

buying    race    horses    and    actresses?     Besides,    the 

trouble  with  you  fellows  is  that  you  don't  know  the 

game  of  buying  brains.     I  do.     That's  my  specialty. 

^-Pnr  going  to  make  money  out  of  them,  and,  better 

than  that,  I'm  going  to  make  a  dozen  blades  of  grass 

\    grow  where  you  fellows  didn't  leave  room  for  half 

2  blade  in  the  soil  you  gutted." 

So  it  can  be  understood  how  his  guardians  could 
not  believe  in  his  promise  of  wild  career,  of  kissing 
and  risking,  and  hitting  men  hot  on  the  jaw. 

u  One  year  more,"  he  warned,  while  he  delved  in 
agricultural  chemistry,  soil  analysis,  farm  manage 
ment,  and  traveled  California  with  his  corps  of  high- 
salaried  experts.  And  his  guardians  could  only  ap 
prehend  a  swift  and  wide  dispersal  of  the  Forrest 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  77 

millions  when  Dick  attained  his  majority,  took  charge 
of  the  totality  of  his  fortune,  and  actually  embarked 
on  his  agricultural  folly. 

The  day  he  was  twenty-one  the  purchase  of  his 
principality,  that  extended  west  from  the  Sacramento 
River  to  the  mountain  tops,  was  consummated. 

"  An  incredible  price,"  said  Mr.  Crockett. 

"  Incredibly  cheap,"  said  Dick.  "  You  ought  to 
see  my  soil  reports.  You  ought  to  see  my  water-re 
ports.  And  you  ought  to  hear  me  sing.  Listen, 
guardians,  to  a  song  that  is  a  true  song.  I  am  the 
singer  and  the  song." 

Whereupon,  in  the  queer  quavering  falsetto  that  is 
the  sense  of  song  to  the  North  American  Indian,  the 
Eskimo,  and  the  Mongol,  Dick  sang: 

"  Hu'-tim  yo'-kim  koi-o-di' ! 
Wi'-hi  yan'-ning  koi-o-di' ! 
Lo'-whi  yan'-ning  koi-o-di'! 
Yo-ho'  Nai-ni',  hal-u'-dom  yo  nai,  yo-ho'  nai- 
nim'!" 

"  The  music  is  my  own,"  he  murmured  apologeti 
cally,  "  the  way  I  think  it  ought  to  have  sounded. 
You  see,  no  man  lives  who  ever  heard  it  sung.  The 
Nishinam  got  it  from  the  Maidu,  who  got  it  from  the 
Konkau,  who  made  it.  But  the  Nishinam  and  the 
Maidu  and  the  Konkau  are  gone.  Their  last  ranch- 
eria  is  not.  You  plowed  it  under,  Mr.  Crockett, 
with  you  bonanza  gang-plowing,  plow-soling  farm 
ing.  And  I  got  the  song  from  a  certain  ethnological 
report,  volume  three,  of  the  United  States  Pacific 
Coast  Geographical  and  Geological  Survey.  Red 
Cloud,  who  was  formed  out  of  the  sky,  first  sang  this 


78  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

song  to  the  stars  and  the  mountain  flowers  in  the 
morning  of  the  world.  I  shall  now  sing  it  for  you 
in  English." 

And  again,  in  Indian  falsetto,  ringing  with  tri 
umph,  vernal  and  bursting,  slapping  his  thighs  and 
stamping  his  feet  to  the  accent,  Dick  sang : 

"  The  acorns  come  down  from  heaven ! 
I  plant  the  short  acorns  in  the  valley ! 
I  plant  the  long  acorns  in  the  valley ! 
I  sprout,  I,  the  black-oak  acorn,  sprout,  I  sprout!  " 

Dick  Forrest's  name  began  to  appear  in  the  news 
papers  with  appalling  frequency.  He  leaped  to  in 
stant  fame  by  being  the  first  man  in  California  who 
paid  ten  thousand  dollars  for  a  single  bull.  His 
livestock  specialist,  whom  he  had  filched  from  the 
Federal  Government,  in  England  outbid  the  Roths 
childs'  Shire  farm  for  Hillcrest  Chieftain,  quickly 
to  be  known  as  Forrest's  Folly,  paying  for  that 
kingly  animal  no  less  than  five  thousand  guineas. 

"  Let  them  laugh,"  Dick  told  his  ex-guardians. 
"  I  am  importing  forty  Shire  mares.  I'll  write  off 
half  his  price  the  first  twelvemonth.  He  will  be  the 
sire  and  grandsire  of  many  sons  and  grandsons  for 
which  the  Californians  will  fall  over  themselves  to 
buy  of  me  at  from  three  to  five  thousand  dollars  a 
clatter." 

Dick  Forrest  was  guilty  of  many  similar  follies  in 
those  first  months  of  his  majority.  But  the  most 
unthinkable  folly  of  all  was,  after  he  had  sunk  mil 
lions  into  his  original  folly,  that  he  turned  it  over  to 
his  experts  personally  to  develop  along  the  general 
broad  lines  laid  down  by  him,  placed  checks  upon 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  79 

them  that  they  might  not  go  catastrophically  wrong, 
bought  a  ticket  in  a  passenger  brig  to  Tahiti,  and 
went  away  to  run  wild. 

Occasionally  his  guardians  heard  from  him.  At 
one  time  he  was  owner  and  master  of  a  four-masted 
steel  sailing  ship  that  carried  the  English  flag  and 
coals  from  Newcastle.  They  knew  that  much,  be 
cause  they  had  been  called  upon  for  the  purchase 
price,  because  they  read  Dick's  name  in  the  papers 
as  master  when  his  ship  rescued  the  passengers  of 
the  ill-fated  Orion,  and  because  they  collected  the  in 
surance  when  Dick's  ship  was  lost  with  most  of  all 
hands  in  the  great  Fiji  hurricane.  In  1896,  he  was 
in  the  Klondike;  in  1897,  he  was  in  Kamchatka  and 
scurvy-stricken ;  and,  next,  he  erupted  with  the  Ameri 
can  flag  into  the  Philippines.  Once,  although  they 
could  never  learn  how  nor  why,  he  was  owner  and 
master  of  a  crazy  tramp  steamer,  long  since  rejected 
by  Lloyd's,  which  sailed  under  the  aegis  of  Siam. 

From  time  to  time  business  correspondence  com 
pelled  them  to  hear  from  him  from  various  purple 
ports  of  the  purple  seas.  Once,  they  had  to  bring 
the  entire  political  pressure  of  the  Pacific  Coast  to 
bear  upon  Washington  in  order  to  get  him  out  of  a 
scrape  in  Russia,  of  which  affair  not  one  line  appeared 
in  the  daily  press,  but  which  affair  was  secretly  pro 
vocative  of  ticklish  joy  and  delight  in  all  the  chancel 
lories  of  Europe. 

Incidentally,  they  knew  that  he  lay  wounded  in 
Maf eking;  that  he  pulled  through  a  bout  with  yellow 
fever  in  Guayaquil;  and  that  he  stood  trial  for  bru 
tality  on  the  high  seas  in  New  York  City.  Thrice 
they  read  in  the  press  dispatches  that  he  was  dead: 


8o  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

once,  in  battle,  in  Mexico;  and  twice,  executed,  in 
Venezuela.  After  such  false  flutterings,  his  guard 
ians  refused  longer  to  be  thrilled  when  he  crossed 
the  Yellow  Sea  in  a  sampan,  was  "  rumored  "  to  have 
died  of  beri-beri,  was  captured  from  the  Russians  by 
the  Japanese  at  Mukden,  and  endured  military  im 
prisonment  in  Japan. 

The  one  thrill  of  which  they  were  still  capable, 
was  when,  true  to  promise,  thirty  years  of  age,  his 
wild  oats  sown,  he  returned  to  California  with  a  wife 
to  whom,  as  he  announced,  he  had  been  married  sev 
eral  years,  and  whom  all  his  three  guardians  found 
they  knew.  Mr.  Slocum  had  dropped  eight  hundred 
thousand  along  with  the  totality  of  her  father's  for 
tune  in  the  final  catastrophe  at  the  Los  Cocos  mine  in 
Chihuahua  when  the  United  States  demonetized  sil 
ver.  Mr.  Davidson  had  pulled  a  million  out  of  the 
Last  Stake  along  with  her  father  when  he  pulled  eight 
millions  from  that  sunken,  man-resurrected,  river 
bed  in  Amador  County.  Mr.  Crockett,  a  youth  at 
the  time,  had  "  spooned  "  the  Merced  bottom  with 
her  father  in  the  late  'fifties,  had  stood  up  best  man 
with  him  at  Stockton  when  he  married  her  mother, 
and,  at  Grant's  Pass,  had  played  poker  with  him  and 
with  the  then  Lieutenant  U.  S.  Grant  when  all  the 
little  the  western  world  knew  of  that  young  lieuten 
ant  was  that  he  was  a  good  Indian  fighter  but  a  poor 
poker  player. 

And  Dick  Forrest  had  married  the  daughter  of 
Philip  Desten!  It  was  not  a  case  of  wishing  Dick 
luck.  It  was  a  case  of  garrulous  insistence  on  the 
fact  that  he  did  not  know  how  lucky  he  was.  His 
guardians  forgave  him  all  his  wildness.  He  had 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  81 

made  good.  At  last  he  had  performed  a  purely  ra 
tional  act.  Better;  it  was  a  stroke  of  genius.  Paula 
Desten!  Philip  Desten's  daughter!  The  Desten 
blood!  The  Destens  and  the  Forrests!  It  was 
enough.  The  three  aged  comrades  of  Forrest  and 
Desten  of  the  old  Gold  Days,  of  the  two  who  had 
played  and  passed  on,  were  even  severe  with  Dick. 
They  warned  him  of  the  extreme  value  of  his  treas 
ure,  of  the  sacred  duty  such  wedlock  imposed  on  him, 
of  all  the  traditions  and  virtues  of  the  Desten  and 
Forrest  blood,  until  Dick  laughed  and  broke  in  with 
the  disconcerting  statement  that  they  were  talking 
like  a  bunch  of  fanciers  or  eugenics  cranks  —  which 
was  precisely  what  they  were  talking  like,  although 
they  did  not  care  to  be  told  so  crassly. 

At  any  rate,  the  simple  fact  that  he  had  married 
a  Desten  made  them  nod  unqualified  approbation 
when  he  showed  them  the  plans  and  building  esti 
mates  of  the  Big  House.  Thanks  to  Paula  Desten, 
for  once  they  were  agreed  that  he  was  spending 
wisely  and  well.  As  for  his  farming,  it  was  incon- 
testible  that  the  Harvest  Group  was  unfalteringly 
producing,  and  he  might  be  allowed  his  hobbies. 
Nevertheless,  as  Mr.  Slocum  put  it:  "  Twenty-five 
thousand  dollars  for  a  mere  work-horse  stallion  is  a 
madness.  Work-horses  are  work-horses;  now  had 
it  been  running  stock.  .  .  ." 


CHAPTER  VII 

WHILE  Dick  Forrest  scanned  the  pamphlet 
on  hog  cholera  issued  by  the  State  of  Iowa, 
through  his  open  windows,  across  the  wide 
court,  began  to  come  sounds  of  the  awakening  of  the 
girl  who  laughed  from  the  wooden  frame  by  his 
bed  and  who  had  left  on  the  floor  of  his  sleeping 
porch,  not  so  many  hours  before,  the  rosy,  filmy, 
lacy,  boudoir  cap  so  circumspectly  rescued  by  Oh  My. 

Dick  heard  her  voice,  for  she  awoke,  like  a  bird, 
with  song.  He  heard  her  trilling,  in  and  out  through 
open  windows,  all  down  the  long  wing  that  was  hers. 
And  he  heard  her  singing  in  the  patio  garden,  where, 
also,  she  desisted  long  enough  to  quarrel  with  her 
Airedale  and  scold  the  collie  pup  unholily  attracted 
by  the  red-orange,  divers-finned,  and  many-tailed 
Japanese  goldfish  in  the  fountain  basin. 

He  was  aware  of  pleasure  that  she  was  awake. 
It  was  a  pleasure  that  never  staled.  Always,  up 
himself  for  hours,  he  had  a  sense  that  the  Big  House 
was  not  really  awake  until  he  heard  Paula's  morning 
song  across  the  patio. 

But  having  tasted  the  pleasure  of  knowing  her  to 
be  awake,  Dick,  as  usual,  forgot  her  in  his  own  af 
fairs.  She  went  out  of  his  consciousness  as  he  be 
came  absorbed  again  in  the  Iowa  statistics  on  hog 
cholera. 

82 


THE  LITTLE  LADY  83 

"  Good  morning,  Merry  Gentleman/*  was  the  next 
he  heard,  always  adorable  music  in  his  ears;  and 
Paula  flowed  in  upon  him,  all  softness  of  morning 
kimono  and  stayless  body,  as  her  arm  passed  around 
his  neck  and  she  perched,  half  in  his  arms,  on  one 
accommodating  knee  of  his.  And  he  pressed  her, 
and  advertised  his  awareness  of  her  existence  and 
nearness,  although  his  eyes  lingered  a  full  half  min 
ute  longer  on  the  totals  of  results  of  Professor 
Kenealy's  hog  inoculations  on  Simon  Jones'  farm  at 
Washington,  Iowa. 

"  My!  "  she  protested.  "You  are  too  fortunate. 
You  are  sated  with  riches.  Here  is  your  Lady  Boy, 
your  c  little  haughty  moon,'  and  you  haven't  even 
said,  *  Good  morning,  Little  Lady  Boy,  was  your 
sleep  sweet  and  gentle  ?  ' 

And  Dick  Forrest  forsook  the  statistical  columns 
of  Professor  Kenealy's  inoculations,  pressed  his  wife 
closer,  kissed  her,  but  with  insistent  right  fore-finger 
maintained  his  place  in  the  pages  of  the  pamphlet. 

Nevertheless,  the  very  terms  of  her  reproof  pre 
vented  him  from  asking  what  he  should  have  asked 
—  the  prosperity  of  her  night  since  the  boudoir  cap 
had  been  left  upon  his  sleeping  porch.  He  shut  the 
pamphlet  on  his  right  fore-finger,  at  the  place  he  in 
tended  to  resume,  and  added  his  right  arm  to  his  left 
about  her. 

"  Oh !  "  she  cried.     "  Oh !     Oh !     Listen !  " 

From  without  came  the  flute-calls  of  quail.  She 
quivered  against  him  with  the  joy  she  took  in  the 
mellow-sweet  notes. 

*  The  coveys  are  breaking  up,"  he  said. 

"  It  means  spring,"  Paula  cried. 


84  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  And  the  sign  that  good  weather  has  come." 

"And  love!" 

"  And  nest-building  and  egg-laying,"  Dick  laughed. 
"  Never  has  the  world  seemed  more  fecund  than  this 
morning.  Lady  Isleton  is  farrowed  of  eleven.  The 
angoras  were  brought  down  this  morning  for  the 
kidding.  You  should  have  seen  them.  And  the 
wild  canaries  have  been  discussing  matrimony  in  the 
patio  for  hours.  I  think  some  free  lover  is  trying 
to  break  up  their  monogamic  heaven  with  modern 
love-theories.  It's  a  wonder  you  slept  through  the 
discussion.  Listen!  There  they  go  now.  Is  that 
applause ?  Or  is  it  a  riot?  " 

Arose  a  thin  twittering,  like  elfin  pipings,  with 
sharp  pitches  and  excited  shrillnesses,  to  which  Dick 
and  Paula  lent  delighted  ears,  till,  suddenly,  with 
the  abruptness  of  the  trump  of  doom,  all  the  micro- 
phonic  chorus  of  the  tiny  golden  lovers  was  swept 
away,  obliterated,  in  a  Gargantuan  blast  of  sound  — 
no  less  wild,  no  less  musical,  no  less  passionate  with 
love,  but  immense,  dominant,  compelling  by  very 
vastitude  of  volume. 

The  eager  eyes  of  the  man  and  woman  sought  in 
stantly  the  channel  past  open  French  windows  and 
the  screen  of  the  sleeping  porch  to  the  road  through 
the  lilacs,  while  they  waited  breathlessly  for  the 
great  stallion  to  appear  who  trumpeted  his  love-call 
before  him.  Again,  unseen,  he  trumpeted,  and  Dick 
said: 

"  I  will  sing  you  a  song,  my  haughty  moon.  It 
is  not  my  song.  It  is  the  Mountain  Lad's.  It  is 
what  he  nickers.  Listen !  He  sings  it  again.  This 
is  what  he  says:  '  Hear  me !  I  am  Eros.  I  stamp 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  85 

upon  the  hills.  I  fill  the  wide  valleys.  The  mares 
hear  me,  and  startle,  in  quiet  pastures ;  for  they  know 
me.  The  grass  grows  rich  and  richer,  the  land  is 
filled  with  fatness,  and  the  sap  is  in  the  trees.  It  is 
the  spring.  The  spring  is  mine.  I  am  monarch  of 
my  kingdom  of  the  spring.  The  mares  remember  my 
voice.  They  know  me  aforetime  through  their  moth 
ers  before  them.  Hear  me !  I  am  Eros.  I  stamp 
upon  the  hills,  and  the  wide  valleys  are  my  heralds, 
echoing  the  sound  of  my  approach.' ' 

And  Paula  pressed  closer  to  her  husband,  and  was 
pressed,  as  her  lips  touched  his  forehead,  and  as 
the  pair  of  them,  gazing  at  the  empty  road  among 
the  lilacs,  saw  it  filled  with  the  eruptive  vision  of 
Mountain  Lad,  majestic  and  mighty,  the  gnat-crea 
ture  of  a  man  upon  his  back  absurdly  small;  his  eyes 
wild  and  desirous,  with  the  blue  sheen  that  surfaces 
the  eyes  of  stallions;  his  mouth,  flecked  with  the 
froth  and  fret  of  high  spirit,  now  brushed  to  bur 
nished  knees  of  impatience,  now  tossed  skyward  to 
utterance  of  that  vast,  compelling  call  that  shook  the 
air. 

Almost  as  an  echo,  from  afar  off,  came  a  thin- 
sweet  answering  whinney. 

"  It  is  the  Fotherington  Princess,"  Paula  breathed 
softly. 

Again  Mountain  Lad  trumpeted  his  call,  and  Dick 
chanted : 

"  Hear  me !  I  am  Eros !  I  stamp  upon  the 
hills!" 

And  almost,  for  a  flash  of  an  instant,  circled  soft 
and  close  in  his  arms,  Paula  knew  resentment  of  her 
husband's  admiration  for  the  splendid  beast.  And 


86  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

the  next  instant  resentment  vanished,  and,  in  acknowl 
edgment  of  due  debt,  she  cried  gaily : 

"  And  now,  Red  Cloud!  the  Song  of  the  Acorn!  " 
Dick  glanced  half  absently  to  her  from  the  pam 
phlet  folded  on  his  finger,  and  then,  with  equal  pitch 
of  gaiety,  sang: 

'  The  acorns  come  down  from  heaven ! 
I  plant  the  short  acorns  in  the  valley ! 
I  plant  the  long  acorns  in  the  valley! 
I  sprout,  I,  the  black-oak  acorn,  sprout,  I  sprout!  " 

She  had  impressed  herself  very  close  against  him 
during  his  moment  of  chanting,  but,  in  the  first  mo 
ments  that  succeeded  she  felt  the  restless  movement 
of  the  hand  that  held  the  finger-marked  hog-pam 
phlet  and  caught  the  swift -though  involuntary  flash 
of  his  eye  to  the  clock  on  his  desk  that  marked  1 1 125. 
Again  she  tried  to  hold  him,  although,  with  equal 
involuntariness,  her  attempt  was  made  in  mild  terms 
of  resentment. 

'  You  are  a  strange  and  wonderful  Red  Cloud," 
she  said  slowly.  "  Sometimes  almost  am  I  con 
vinced  that  you  are  utterly  Red  Cloud,  planting  your 
acorns  and  singing  your  savage  joy  of  the  planting. 
And,  sometimes,  almost  you  are  to  me  the  ultra 
modern  man,  the  last  word  of  the  two-legged,  male 
human  that  finds  Trojan  adventures  in  sieges  of  sta 
tistics,  and,  armed  with  test  tubes  and  hypodermics, 
engages  in  gladiatorial  contests  with  weird  micro 
organisms.  Almost,  at  times,  it  seems  you  should 
wear  glasses  and  be  bald-headed;  almost,  it 
seems.  .  .  ." 

"  That  I  have  no  right  of  vigor  to  possess  an  arm- 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  87 

ful  of  girl,"  he  completed  for  her,  drawing  her  still 
closer.  "  That  I  am  a  silly  scientific  brute  who 
doesn't  merit  his  '  vain  little  breath  of  sweet  rose- 
colored  dust.'  Well,  listen,  I  have  a  plan.  In  a 
few  days.  ..." 

But  his  plan  died  in  birth,  for,  at  their  backs,  came 
a  discreet  cough  of  warning,  and,  both  heads  turn 
ing  as  one,  they  saw  Bonbright,  the  assistant  secre 
tary,  with  a  sheaf  of  notes  on  yellow  sheets  in  his 
hand. 

"  Four  telegrams,"  he  murmured  apologetically. 
"  Mr.  Blake  is  confident  that  twro  of  them  are  very 
important.  One  of  them  concerns  that  Chile  ship 
ment  of  bulls.  .  .  ." 

And  Paula,  slowly  drawing  away  from  her  hus 
band  and  rising  to  her  feet,  could  feel  him  slipping 
from  her  toward  his  tables  of  statistics,  bills  of 
lading,  and  secretaries,  foremen,  and  managers. 

"  Oh,  Paula,"  Dick  called,  as  she  was  fading 
through  the  doorway;  "  I've  christened  the  last  boy 
—  he's  to  be  known  as  *  Oh  Ho.'  How  do  you  like 
it?" 

Her  reply  began  with  a  hint  of  forlornness  that 
vanished  with  her  smile,  as  she  warned: 

"  You  will  play  ducks  and  drakes  with  the  house- 
boys'  names." 

"  I  never  do  it  with  pedigreed  stock,"  he  assured 
her  with  a  solemnity  belied  by  the  challenging  twin 
kle  in  his  eyes. 

"  I  didn't  mean  that,"  was  her  retort  "  I  meant 
that  you  were  exhausting  the  possibilities  of  the 
language.  Before  long  you'll  have  to  be  calling 
them  Oh  Bel,  Oh  Hell,  and  Oh  Go  to  Hell.  Your 


88  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

1  Oh  '  was  a  mistake.  You  should  have  started  with 
'  Red.'  Then  you  could  have  had  Red  Bull,  Red 
Horse,  Red  Dog,  Red  Frog,  Red  Fern  —  and,  and 
all  the  rest  of  the  reds." 

She  mingled  her  laughter  with  his,  as  she  vanished, 
and,  the  next  moment,  the  telegram  before  him,  he 
was  immersed  in  the  details  of  the  shipment,  at  two 
hundred  and  fifty  dollars  each,  F.  O.  B.,  of  three 
hundred  registered  yearling  bulls  to  the  beef  ranges 
of  Chile.  Even  so,  vaguely,  with  vague  pleasure, 
he  heard  Paula  sing  her  way  back  across  the  patio 
to  her  long  wing  of  house;  though  he  was  unaware 
that  her  voice  was  a  trifle,  just  the  merest  trifle,  sub 
dued. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

FIVE  minutes  after  Paula  had  left  him,  punctual 
to  the  second,  the  four  telegrams  disposed  of, 
Dick  was  getting  into  a  ranch  motor  car,  along 
with  Thayer,  the  Idaho  buyer,  and  Naismith,  the 
special  correspondent  for  the  Breeders'  Gazette. 
Wardman,  the  sheep  manager,  joined  them  at  the 
corrals  where  several  thousand  young  Shropshire 
rams  had  been  assembled  for  inspection. 

There  was  little  need  for  conversation.  Thayer 
was  distinctly  disappointed  in  this,  for  he  felt  that 
the  purchase  of  ten  carloads  of  such  expensive  crea 
tures  was  momentous  enough  to  merit  much  conver 
sation. 

"  They  speak  for  themselves,"  Dick  had  assured 
him,  and  turned  aside  to  give  data  to  Naismith  for 
his  impending  article  on  Shropshires  in  California 
and  the  Northwest. 

"  I  wouldn't  advise  you  to  bother  to  select  them," 
Dick  told  Thayer  ten  minutes  later.  "  The  average 
is  all  top.  You  could  spend  a  week  picking  your 
ten  carloads  and  have  no  higher  grade  than  if  you 
had  taken  the  first  to  hand." 

This  cool  assumption  that  the  sale  was  already 
consummated  so  perturbed  Thayer,  that,  along  with 
the  sure  knowledge  that  he  had  never  seen  so  high 
a  quality  of  rams,  he  was  nettled  into  changing  his 
order  to  twenty  carloads. 

As  he  told  Naismith,  after  they  had  regained  the 

89 


90  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

Big  House  and  as  they  chalked  their  cues  to  finish 
the  interrupted  game: 

"  It's  my  first  visit  to  Forrest's.  He's  a  wizard. 
I've  been  buying  in  the  East  and  importing.  But 
those  Shropshires  won  my  judgment.  You  noticed 
I  doubled  my  order.  Those  Idaho  buyers  will  be 
wild  for  them.  I  only  had  buying  orders  straight 
for  six  carloads,  and  contingent  on  my  judgment  for 
two  carloads  more ;  but  if  every  buyer  doesn't  double 
his  order,  straight  and  contingent,  when  he  sees  them 
rams,  and  if  there  isn't  a  stampede  for  what's  left, 
I  don't  know  sheep.  They're  the  goods.  If  they 
don't  jump  up  the  sheep  game  of  Idaho  .  .  .  well, 
then  Forrest's  no  breeder  and  I'm  no  buyer,  that's 
all." 

As  the  warning  gong  for  lunch  rang  out  —  a  huge 
bronze  gong  from  Korea  that  was  never  struck  until 
it  was  first  indubitably  ascertained  that  Paula  was 
awake  —  Dick  joined  the  young  people  at  the  gold 
fish  fountain  in  the  big  patio.  Bert  Wainwright, 
variously  advised  and  commanded  by  his  sister,  Rita, 
and  by  Paula  and  her  sisters,  Lute  and  Ernestine, 
was  striving  with  a  dip-net  to  catch  a  particularly 
gorgeous  flower  of  a  fish  whose  size  and  color  and 
multiplicity  of  fins  and  tails  had  led  Paula  to  decide 
to  segregate  him  for  the  special  breeding  tank  in  the 
fountain  of  her  own  secret  patio. 

Amid  high  excitement,  and  much  squealing  and 
laughter,  the  deed  was  accomplished,  the  big  fish 
deposited  in  a  can  and  carried  away  by  the  waiting 
Italian  gardener. 

"  And  what  have  you  to  say  for  yourself?  "  Ernes 
tine  challenged,  as  Dick  joined  them. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  91 

"  Nothing,"  he  answered  sadly.  "  The  ranch  is 
depleted.  Three  hundred  beautiful  young  bulls  de 
part  to-morrow  for  South  America,  and  Thayer  — 
you  met  him  last  night  —  is  taking  twenty  carloads 
of  rams.  All  I  can  say  is  that  my  congratulations 
are  extended  to  Idaho  and  Chile." 

"  Plant  more  acorns,"  Paula  laughed,  her  arms 
about  her  sisters,  the  three  of  them  smilingly  expec 
tant  of  an  inevitable  antic. 

"  Oh,  Dick,  sing  your  acorn  song,"  Lute  begged. 

He  shook  his  head  solemnly. 

"  I've  got  a  better  one.  It's  purest  orthodoxy. 
It's  got  Red  Cloud  and  his  acorn  song  skinned  to 
death.  Listen !  This  is  the  song  of  the  little  East- 
sider,  on  her  first  trip  to  the  country  under  the  au 
spices  of  her  Sunday  School.  She's  quite  young. 
Pay  particular  attention  to  her  lisp." 

And  then  Dick  chanted,  lisping: 

"  The  goldfish  thwimmeth  in  the  bowl, 
The  robin  thiths  upon  the  tree ; 
What  maketh  them  thit  so  eathily? 
Who  stuckth  the  fur  upon  their  breasths? 
God!     God!     He  done  it!" 

"  Cribbed,"  was  Ernestine's  judgment,  as  the 
laughter  died  away. 

"  Sure,"  Dick  agreed.  "  I  got  it  from  the 
Rancher  and  Stockman,  that  got  it  from  the  Swine 
Breeders9  Journal,  that  got  it  from  the  Western  Ad 
vocate,  that  got  it  from  Public  Opinion,  that  got  it, 
undoubtedly,  from  the  little  girl  herself,  or,  rather 
from  her  Sunday  School  teacher.  For  that  matter 
I  am  convinced  it  was  first  printed  in  Our  Dumb 
Animals" 


92  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

The  bronze  gong  rang  out  its  second  call,  and 
Paula,  one  arm  around  Dick,  the  other  around  Rita, 
led  the  way  into  the  house,  while,  bringing  up  the 
rear,  Bert  Wainwright  showed  Lute  Ernestine  a  new 
tango  step. 

"  One  thing,  Thayer,"  Dick  said  in  an  aside,  after 
releasing  himself  from  the  girls,  as  they  jostled  in 
confusion  where  they  met  Thayer  and  Naismith  at 
the  head  of  the  stairway  leading  down  to  the  dining 
room.  "  Before  you  leave  us,  cast  your  eyes  over 
those  Merinos.  I  really  have  to  brag  about  them, 
and  American  sheepmen  will  have  to  come  to  them. 
Of  course,  started  with  imported  stock,  but  I've  made 
a  California  strain  that  will  make  the  French  breeders 
sit  up.  See  Wardman  and  take  your  pick.  Get 
Naismith  to  look  them  over  with  you.  Stick  half 
a  dozen  of  them  in  your  train-load,  with  my  compli 
ments,  and  let  your  Idaho  sheepmen  get  a  line  on 
them." 

They  seated  at  a  table,  capable  of  indefinite  ex 
tension,  in  a  long,  low  dining  room  that  was  a  replica 
of  the  hacienda  dining  rooms  of  the  Mexican  land- 
kings  of  old  California.  The  floor  was  of  large 
brown  tiles,  the  beamed  ceiling  and  the  walls  were 
whitewashed,  and  the  huge,  undecorated,  cement  fire- 
plare  was  an  achievement  in  massiveness  and  sim 
plicity.  Greenery  and  blooms  nodded  from  without 
the  deep-embrasured  windows,  and  the  room  ex 
pressed  the  sense  of  cleanness,  chastity,  and  coolness. 

On  the  walls,  but  not  crowded,  were  a  number  of 
canvases  —  most  ambitious  of  all,  in  the  setting  of 
honor,  all  in  sad  grays,  a  twilight  Mexican  scene  by 
Xavier  Martinez,  of  a  peon,  with  a  crooked-stick 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  93 

plow  and  two  bullocks,  turning  a  melancholy  furrow 
across  the  foreground  of  a  sad,  illimitable,  Mexican 
plain.  There  were  brighter  pictures,  of  early  Mexi- 
can-Californian  life,  a  pastel  of  twilight  eucalyptus 
with  a  sunset-tipped  mountain  beyond,  by  Reimers, 
a  moonlight  by  Peters,  and  a  Griffin  stubble-field 
across  which  gleamed  and  smoldered  California 
summer  hills  of  tawny  brown  and  purple-misted, 
wooded  canyons. 

"  Say,"  Thayer  muttered  in  an  undertone  across  to 
Naismith,  while  Dick  and  the  girls  were  in  the  thick 
of  exclamatory  and  giggling  banter,  "  here's  some 
stuff  for  that  article  of  yours,  if  you  touch  upon  the 
Big  House.  I've  seen  the  servants'  dining  room. 
Forty  head  sit  down  to  it  every  meal,  including  gar 
deners,  chauffeurs,  and  outside  help.  It's  a  boarding 
house  in  itself.  Some  head,  some  system,  take  it 
from  me.  That  Chiney  boy,  Oh  Joy,  is  a  wooz. 
He's  housekeeper,  or  manager,  of  the  whole  she 
bang,  or  whatever  you  want  to  call  his  job and, 

say,  it  runs  that  smooth  you  can't  hear  it." 

"  Forrest's  the  real  wooz,"  Naismith  nodded. 
"  He's  the  brains  that  picks  brains.  He  could  run 
an  army,  a  campaign,  a  government,  or  even  a  three- 
ring  circus." 

"  Which  last  is  some  compliment,"  Thayer  con 
curred  heartily. 

"  Oh,  Paula,"  Dick  said  across  to  his  wife.  "  I 
just  got  word  that  Graham  arrives  to-morrow  morn 
ing.  Better  tell  Oh  Joy  to  put  him  in  the  watch- 
tower.  It's  man-size  quarters,  and  it's  possible  he 
may  carry  out  his  threat  and  work  on  his  book." 


94  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"Graham?  —  Graham?"  Paula  queried  aloud 
of  her  memory.  "  Do  I  know  him?  " 

1  You  met  him  once  two  years  ago,  in  Santiago, 
at  the  Cafe  Venus.  He  had  dinner  with  us." 

"  Oh,  one  of  those  naval  officers?  " 

Dick  shook  his  head. 

"  The  civilian.  Don't  you  remember  that  big 
blond  fellow  —  you  talked  music  with  him  for  half 
an  hour  while  Captain  Joyce  talked  our  heads  off 
to  prove  that  the  United  States  should  clean  Mexico 
up  and  out  with  the  mailed  fist." 

"  Oh,  to  be  sure,"  Paula  vaguely  recollected. 
"  He'd  met  you  somewhere  before  .  .  .  South 
Africa,  wasn't  it?  Or  the  Philippines?  " 

1  That's  the  chap.  South  Africa,  it  was.  Evan 
Graham.  Next  time  we  met  was  on  the  Times  dis 
patch  boat  on  the  Yellow  Sea.  And  we  crossed  trails 
a  dozen  times  after  that,  without  meeting,  until  that 
night  in  the  Cafe  Venus. 

"Heavens  —  he  left  Bora-Bora,  going  east,  two 
days  before  I  dropped  anchor  bound  west  on  my  way 
to  Samoa.  I  came  out  of  Apia,  with  letters  for  him 
from  the  American  consul,  the  day  before  he  came  in. 
We  missed  each  other  by  three  days  at  Levuka  —  I 
was  sailing  the  Wild  Duck  then.  He  pulled  out  of 
Suva  as  guest  on  a  British  cruiser.  Sir  Everard  Im 
Thurm,  British  High  Commissioner  of  the  South 
Seas,  gave  me  more  letters  for  Graham.  I  missed 
him  at  Port  Resolution  and  at  Vila  in  the  New 
Hebrides.  The  cruiser  was  junketing,  you  see.  I 
beat  her  in  and  out  of  the  Santa  Cruz  Group.  It 
was  the  same  thing  in  the  Solomons.  The  cruiser, 
after  shelling  the  cannibal  villages  at  Langa-Langa, 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  95 

steamed  out  in  the  morning.  I  sailed  in  that  after 
noon.  I  never  did  deliver  those  letters  in  person, 
and  the  next  time  I  laid  eyes  on  him  was  at  the  Cafe 
Venus  two  years  ago.'* 

"  But  who  about  him,  and  what  about  him?" 
Paula  queried.  "And  what's  the  book?" 

"  Well,  first  of  all,  beginning  at  the  end,  he's  broke 
—  that  is,  for  him,  he's  broke.  He's  got  an  income 
of  several  thousand  a  year  left,  but  all  that  his  fa 
ther  left  him  is  gone.  No;  he  didn't  blow  it.  He 
got  in  deep,  and  the  '  silent  panic '  several  years  ago 
just  about  cleaned  him.  But  he  doesn't  whimper. 

"  He's  good  stuff,  old  American  stock,  a  Yale  man. 
The  book  —  he  expects  to  make  a  bit  on  it  —  covers 
last  year's  trip  across  South  America,  west  coast  to 
east  coast.  It  was  largely  new  ground.  The  Bra 
zilian  government  voluntarily  voted  him  a  honora 
rium  of  ten  thousand  dollars  for  the  information  he 
brought  out  concerning  unexplored  portions  of  Brazil. 
Oh,  he's  a  man,  all  man.  He  delivers  the  goods. 
You  know  the  type  —  clean,  big,  strong,  simple ;  been 
everywhere,  seen  everything,  knows  most  of  a  lot  of 
things,  straight,  square,  looks  you  in  the  eyes  —  well, 
in  short,  a  man's  man." 

Ernestine  clapped  her  hands,  flung  a  tantalizing, 
man-challenging,  man-conquering  glance  at  Bert 
Wainwright,  and  exclaimed:  "  And  he  comes  to 
morrow!  " 

Dick  shook  his  head  reprovingly. 

"  Oh,  nothing  in  that  direction,  Ernestine.  Just 
as  nice  girls  as  you  have  tried  to  hook  Evan  Graham 
before  now.  And,  between  ourselves,  I  couldn't 
blame  them.  But  he's  had  good  wind  and  fast  legs, 


96  THE  LITTLE  LADY     * 

and  they've  always  failed  to  run  him  down  or  get 
him  into  a  corner,  where,  dazed  and  breathless,  he's 
mechanically  muttered  '  Yes  '  to  certain  interrogato 
ries  and  come  out  of  the  trance  to  find  himself,  roped, 
thrown,  branded,  and  married.  Forget  him,  Ernes 
tine.  Stick  by  golden  youth  and  let  it  drop  its  golden 
apples.  Pick  them  up,  and  golden  youth  with  them, 
making  a  noise  like  stupid  failure  all  the  time  you 
are  snaring  swift-legged  youth.  But  Graham's  out 
of  the  running.  He's  old  like  me  —  just  about  the 
same  age  —  and,  like  me,  he's  run  a  lot  of  those 
queer  races.  He  knows  how  to  make  a  get-away. 
He's  been  cut  by  barbed  wire,  nose-twitched,  neck- 
burnt,  cinched  to  a  fare-you-well,  and  he  remains  sub 
dued  but  uncatchable.  He  doesn't  care  for  young 
things.  In  fact,  you  may  charge  him  with  being 
wobbly,  but  I  plead  guilty,  by  proxy,  that  he  is  merely 
old,  hard  bitten,  and  very  wise." 


CHAPTER  IX 

"TT  THERE'S  my   Boy  in   Breeches? "   Dick 

V/V/     shouted,    stamping   with    jingling   spurs 
'       through  the  Big  House  in  quest  of  its 
Little  Lady. 

He  came  to  the  door  that  gave  entrance  to  her 
long  wing.  It  was  a  door  without  a  knob,  a  huge 
panel  of  wood  in  a  wood-paneled  wall.  But  Dick 
shared  the  secret  of  the  hidden  spring  with  his  wife, 
pressed  the  spring,  and  the  door  swung  wide. 

"Where's  my  Boy  in  Breeches?"  he  called  and 
stamped  down  the  length  of  her  quarters. 

A  glance  into  the  bathroom,  with  its  sunken  Roman 
bath  and  descending  marble  steps,  was  fruitless,  as 
were  the  glances  he  sent  into  Paula's  wardrobe  room 
and  dressing  room.  He  passed  the  short,  broad 
stairway  that  led  to  her  empty  window-seat  divan  in 
what  she  called  her  Juliet  Tower,  and  thrilled  at 
sight  of  an  orderly  disarray  of  filmy,  pretty,  lacy 
woman's  things  that  he  knew  she  had  spread  out 
for  her  own  sensuous  delight  of  contemplation.  He 
fetched  up  for  a  moment  at  a  drawing  easel,  his  re- 
iterant  cry  checked  on  his  lips,  and  threw  a  laugh 
of  recognition  and  appreciation  at  the  sketch,  just 
outlined,  of  an  awkward,  big-boned,  knobby,  wean 
ling  colt  caught  in  the  act  of  madly  whinneying  for 
its  mother. 

97 


98  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  Where's  my  Boy  in  Breeches?  "  he  shouted  be 
fore  him,  out  to  the  sleeping  porch;  and  found  only 
a  demure,  brow-troubled  Chinese  woman  of  thirty, 
who  smiled  self-effacing  embarrassment  into  his  eyes. 

This  was  Paula's  maid,  Oh  Dear,  so  named  by 
Dick,  many  years  before,  because  of  a  certain  so 
licitous  contraction  of  her  delicate  brows  that  made 
her  appear  as  if  ever  on  the  verge  of  saying,  "  Oh 
dear!  "  In  fact,  Dick  had  taken  her,  as  a  child 
almost,  for  Paula's  service,  from  a  fishing  village  on 
the  Yellow  Sea  where  her  widow-mother  earned  as 
much  as  four  dollars  in  a  prosperous  year  at  making 
nets  for  the  fishermen.  Oh  Dear's  first  service  for 
Paula  had  been  aboard  the  three-topmast  schooner, 
All  Away,  at  the  same  time  that  Oh  Joy,  cabin-boy, 
had  begun  to  demonstrate  the  efficiency  that  enabled 
him,  through  the  years,  to  rise  to  the  majordomoship 
of  the  Big  House. 

"  Where  is  your  mistress,  Oh  Dear?  "  Dick  asked. 

Oh  Dear  shrank  away  in  an  agony  of  bashfulness. 

Dick  waited. 

"  She  maybe  with  'm  young  ladies  —  I  don't 
know,"  Oh  Dear  stammered;  and  Dick,  in  very 
mercy,  swung  away  on  his  heel. 

"Where's  my  Boy  in  Breeches?"  he  shouted,  as 
he  stamped  out  under  the  porte  cochere  just  as  a 
ranch  limousine  swung  around  the  curve  among  the 
lilacs. 

"  I'll  be  hanged  if  I  know,"  a  tall,  blond  man  in 
a  light  summer  suit  responded  from  the  car ;  and  the 
next  moment  Dick  Forrest  and  Evan  Graham  were 
shaking  hands. 

Oh  My  and  Oh  Ho  carried  in  the  hand  baggage, 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  99 

and  Dick  accompanied  his  guest  to  the  watch  tower 
quarters. 

"  You'll  have  to  get  used  to  us,  old  man,"  Dick 
was  explaining.  '*  We  run  the  ranch  like  clockwork, 
and  the  servants  are  wonders ;  but  we  allow  ourselves 
all  sorts  of  loosenesses.  If  you'd  arrived  two  min 
utes  later  there'd  have  been  no  one  to  welcome  you 
but  the  Chinese  boys.  I  was  just  going  for  a  ride, 
and  Paula  —  Mrs.  Forrest  —  has  disappeared." 

The  two  men  were  almost  of  a  size,  Graham  top 
ping  his  host  by  perhaps  an  inch,  but  losing  that  inch 
in  the  comparative  breadth  of  shoulders  and  depth 
of  chest.  Graham  was,  if  anything,  a  clearer  blond 
than  Forrest,  although  both  were  equally  gray  of 
eye,  equally  clear  in  the  whites  of  the  eyes,  and 
equally  and  precisely  similarly  bronzed  by  sun  and 
weather-beat.  Graham's  features  were  in  a  slightly 
larger  mold;  his  eyes  were  a  trifle  longer,  although 
this  was  lost  again  by  a  heavier  droop  of  lids.  His 
nose  hinted  that  it  was  a  shade  straighter  as  well  as 
larger  than  Dick's,  and  his  lips  were  a  shade  thicker, 
a  shade  redder,  a  shade  more  bowed  with  fulsome- 
ness. 

Forrest's  hair  was  light  brown  to  chestnut,  while 
Graham's  carried  a  whispering  advertisement  that 
it  would  have  been  almost  golden  in  its  silk  had 
it  not  been  burned  almost  to  sandiness  by  the  sun. 
The  cheeks  of  both  were  high-boned,  although  the 
hollows  under  Forrest's  cheek-bones  were  more  pro 
nounced.  Both  noses  were  large-nostriled  and  sen 
sitive.  And  both  mouths,  while  generously  propor 
tioned,  carried  the  impression  of  girlish  sweetness 
and  chastity  along  with  the  muscles  that  could  draw 


ioo  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

the  lips  to  the  firmness  and  harshness  that  would  not 
give  the  lie  to  the  square,  uncleft  chins  beneath. 

But  the  inch  more  in  height  and  the  inch  less  in 
chest-girth  gave  Evan  Graham  a  grace  of  body  and 
carriage  that  Dick  Forrest  did  not  possess.  In  this 
particular  of  build,  each  served  well  as  a  foil  to  the 
other.  Graham  was  all  light  and  delight,  with  a 
hint  - —  but  the  slightest  of  hints  —  of  Prince  Charm 
ing.  Forrest's  seemed  a  more  efficient  and  formid 
able  organism,  more  dangerous  to  other  life,  stouter- 
gripped  on  its  own  life. 

Forrest  threw  a  glance  at  his  wrist  watch  as  he 
talked,  but  in  that  glance,  without  pause  or  fumble 
of  focus,  with  swift  certainty  of  correlation,  he  read 
the  dial. 

"  Eleven-thirty,"  he  said.  "  Come  along  at  once, 
Graham.  We  don't  eat  till  twelve-thirty.  I  am 
sending  out  a  shipment  of  bulls,  three  hundred  of 
them,  and  I'm  downright  proud  of  them.  You  sim 
ply  must  see  them.  Never  mind  your  riding  togs. 
Oh  Ho  —  fetch  a  pair  of  my  leggings.  You,  Oh  Joy, 
order  Altadena  saddled. —  What  saddle  do  you  pre 
fer,  Graham?  " 

"  Oh,  anything,  old  man." 

"English?  —  Australian?  —  McClellan?  — 
Mexican?  "  Dick  insisted. 

"  McClellan,  if  it's  no  trouble,"  Graham  surren 
dered. 

They  sat  their  horses  by  the  side  of  the  road  and 
watched  the  last  of  the  herd  beginning  its  long  jour 
ney  to  Chili  disappear  around  the  bend. 

"I  see  what  you're  doing  —  it's  great,"  Graham 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  101 

said  with  sparkling  eyes.  "  I've  fooled  some  myself 
with  the  critters,  when  I  was  a  youngster,  down  in 
the  Argentine.  If  I'd  had  beef-blood  like  that 
to  build  on,  I  mightn't  have  taken  the  cropper  I 
did." 

"  But  that  was  before  alfalfa  and  artesian  wells," 
Dick  smoothed  for  him.  "  The  time  wasn't  ripe 
for  the  Shorthorn.  Only  scrubs  could  survive  the 
droughts.  They  were  strong  in  staying  powers  but 
light  on  the  scales.  And  refrigerator  steamships 
hadn't  been  invented.  That's  what  revolutionized 
the  game  down  there." 

"  Besides,  I  was  a  mere  youngster,"  Graham 
added.  "  Though  that  meant  nothing  much.  There 
was  a  young  German  tackled  it  at  the  same  time  I 
did,  with  a  tenth  of  my  capital.  He  hung  it  out,  lean 
years,  dry  years,  and  all.  He's  rated  in  seven  figures 


now." 


They  turned  their  horses  back  for  the  Big  House. 
Dick  flirted  his  wrist  to  see  his  watch. 

"  Lots  of  time,"  he  assured  his  guest.  "  I'm  glad 
you  saw  those  yearlings.  There  was  one  reason 
why  that  young  German  stuck  it  out.  He  had  to. 
You  had  your  father's  money  to  fall  back  on,  and,  I 
imagine  not  only  that  your  feet  itched,  but  that  your 
chief  weakness  lay  in  that  you  could  afford  to  solace 
the  itching." 

,"  Over  there  are  the  fish  ponds,"  Dick  said,  indi 
cating  with  a  nod  of  his  head  to  the  right  an  invisible 
area  beyond  the  lilacs.  *  You'll  have  plenty  of  op 
portunity  to  catch  a  mess  of  trout,  or  bass,  or  even 
catfish.  You  see,  I'm  a  miser.  I  love  to  make 


102  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

things  work.  There  may  be  a  justification  for  the 
eight-hour  labor  day,  but  I  make  the  work-day  of 
water  just  twenty-four  hours'  long.  The  ponds  are 
in  series,  according  to  the  nature  of  the  fish.  But 
the  water  starts  working  up  in  the  mountains.  It  ir 
rigates  a  score  of  mountain  meadows  before  it  makes 
the  plunge  and  is  clarified  to  crystal  clearness  in  the 
next  few  rugged  miles;  and  at  the  plunge  from  the 
highlands  it  generates  half  the  power  and  all  the 
lighting  used  on  the  ranch.  Then  it  sub-irrigates 
lower  levels,  flows  in  here  to  the  fish  ponds,  and  runs 
out  and  irrigates  miles  of  alfalfa  farther  on.  And, 
believe  me,  if  by  that  time  it  hadn't  reached  the  flat 
of  the  Sacramento,  I'd  be  pumping  out  the  drainage 
for  more  irrigation." 

"  Man,  man,"  Graham  laughed,  "  you  could  make 
a  poem  on  the  wonder  of  water.  I've  met  fire-wor 
shipers,  but  you're  the  first  real  water-worshiper 
I've  ever  encountered.  And  you're  no  desert- 
dweller,  either.  You  live  in  a  land  of  water  — 
pardon  the  bull  —  but,  as  I  was  saying  .  .  ." 

Graham  never  completed  his  thought.  From  the 
right,  not  far  away,  came  the  unmistakable  ring  of 
shod  hoofs  on  concrete,  followed  by  a  mighty  splash 
and  an  outburst  of  women's  cries  and  laughter. 
Quickly  the  cries  turned  to  alarm,  accompanied  by  the 
sounds  of  a  prodigious  splashing  and  floundering  as 
of  some  huge,  drowning  beast.  Dick  bent  his  head 
and  leaped  his  horse  through  the  lilacs,  Graham,  on 
Altadena,  followed  at  his  heels.  They  emerged  in 
a  blaze  of  sunshine,  on  an  open  space  among  the 
trees,  and  Graham  came  upon  as  unexpected  a  picture 
as  he  had  ever  chanced  upon  in  his  life. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  103 

Tree-surrounded,  the  heart  of  the  open  space  was 
a  tank,  four-sided  of  concrete.  The  upper  end  of 
the  tank,  full  width,  was  a  broad  spill-way,  sheened 
with  an  inch  of  smooth-slipping  water.  The  sides 
were  perpendicular.  The  lower  end,  roughly  corru 
gated,  sloped  out  gently  to  solid  footing.  Here,  in 
distress  that  was  consternation,  and  in  fear  that  was 
panic,  excitedly  bobbed  up  and  down  a  cowboy  in 
bearskin  chaps,  vacuously  repeating  the  exclamation, 
"  Oh  God !  Oh  God !  "—  the  first  division  of  it  ris 
ing  in  inflection,  the  second  division  inflected  fall- 
ingly  with  despair.  On  the  edge  of  the  farther  side, 
facing  him,  in  bathing  suits,  legs  dangling  toward 
the  water,  sat  three  terrified  nymphs. 

And  in  the  tank,  the  center  of  the  picture,  a  great 
horse,  bright  bay  and  wet  and  ruddy  satin,  vertical  in 
the  water,  struck  upward  and  outward  into  the  free 
air  with  huge  fore-hoofs  steel-gleaming  in  the  wet 
and  sun,  while  on  its  back,  slipping  and  clinging,  was 
the  white  form  of  what  Graham  took  at  first  to  be 
some  glorious  youth.  Not  until  the  stallion,  sinking, 
emerged  again  by  means  of  the  powerful  beat  of  his 
legs  and  hoofs,  did  Graham  realize  that  it  was  a 
woman  who  rode  him  —  a  woman  as  white  as  the 
white  silken  slip  of  a  bathing  suit  that  molded  to  her 
form  like  a  marble-carven  veiling  of  drapery.  As 
marble  was  her  back,  save  that  the  fine  delicate 
muscles  moved  and  crept  under  the  silken  suit  as  she 
strove  to  keep  her  head  above  water.  Her  slim 
round  arms  were  twined  in  yards  of  half-drowned 
stallion-mane,  while  her  white  round  knees  slipped 
on  the  sleek,  wet,  satin  pads  of  the  great  horse's 
straining  shoulder  muscles.  The  white  toes  of  her 


io4  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

dug  for  a  grip  into  the  smooth  sides  of  the  animal, 
vainly  seeking  a  hold  on  the  ribs  beneath. 

In  a  breath,  or  the  half  of  a  breath,  Graham  saw 
the  whole  breathless  situation,  realized  that  the  white 
wonderful  creature  was  a  woman,  and  sensed  the 
smallness  and  daintiness  of  her  despite  her  gladia 
torial  struggles.  She  reminded  him  of  some  Dres 
den  china  figure  set  absurdly  small  and  light  and 
strangely  on  the  drowning  back  of  a  titanic  beast. 
So  dwarfed  was  she  by  the  bulk  of  the  stallion  that 
she  was  a  midget,  or  a  tiny  fairy  from  fairyland  come 
true. 

As  she  pressed  her  cheek  against  the  great  arching 
neck,  her  golden-brown  hair,  wet  from  being  under, 
flowing  and  tangled,  seemed  tangled  in  the  black 
mane  of  the  stallion.  But  it  was  her  face  that  smote 
Graham  most  of  all.  It  was  a  boy's  face;  it  was  a 
woman's  face;  it  was  serious  and  at  the  same  time 
amused,  expressing  the  pleasure  it  found  woven  with 
the  peril.  It  was  a  white  woman's  face  —  and 
modern;  and  yet,  to  Graham,  it  was  all-pagan. 
This  was  not  a  creature  and  a  situation  one  hap 
pened  upon  in  the  twentieth  century.  It  was  straight 
out  of  old  Greece.  It  was  a  Maxfield  Parrish 
reminiscence  from  the  Arabian  Nights.  Genii  might 
be  expected  to  rise  from  those  troubled  depths,  or 
golden  princes,  astride  winged  dragons,  to  swoop 
down  out  of  the  blue  to  the  rescue. 

The  stallion,  forcing  itself  higher  out  of  water, 
missed,  by  a  shade,  from  turning  over  backward  as 
it  sank.  Glorious  animal  and  glorious  rider  disap 
peared  together  beneath  the  surface,  to  rise  together, 
a  second  later,  the  stallion  still  pawing  the  air  with 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  105 

fore-hoofs  the  size  of  dinner  plates,  the  rider  still 
clinging  to  the  sleek,  satin-coated  muscles.  Gra 
ham  thought,  with  a  gasp,  what  might  have  happened 
had  the  stallion  turned  over.  A  chance  blow  from 
any  one  of  those  four  enormous  floundering  hoofs 
could  have  put  out  and  quenched  forever  the  light  and 
sparkle  of  that  superb,  white-bodied,  fire-animated 
woman. 

"Ride  his  neck!"  Dick  shouted.  "Catch  his 
foretop  and  get  on  his  neck  till  he  balances  out!  " 

The  woman  obeyed,  digging  her  toes  into  the 
evasive  muscle-pads  for  the  quick  effort,  and  leaping 
upward,  one  hand  twined  in  the  wet  mane,  the  other 
hand  free  and  up-stretched,  darting  between  the  ears 
and  clutching  the  foretop.  The  next  moment,  as 
the  stallion  balanced  out  horizontally  in  obedience 
to  her  shiftage  of  weight,  she  had  slipped  back  to 
the  shoulders.  Holding  with  one  hand  to  the  mane, 
she  waved  a  white  arm  in  the  air  and  flashed  a  smile 
of  acknowledgment  to  Forrest;  and,  as  Graham 
noted,  she  was  cool  enough  to  note  him  on  his  horse 
beside  Forrest  Also,  Graham  realized  that  the 
turning  of  her  head  and  the  waving  of  her  arm  was 
only  partly  in  bravado,  was  more  in  aesthetic  wisdom 
of  the  picture  she  composed,  and  was,  most  of  all, 
sheer  joy  of  daring  and  emprise  of  the  blood  and  the 
flesh  and  the  life  that  was  she. 

"  Not  many  women'd  tackle  that,"  Dick  said 
quietly,  as  Mountain  Lad,  easily  retaining  his  hori 
zontal  position  once  it  had  been  attained,  swam  to 
the  lower  end  of  the  tank  and  floundered  up  the  rough 
slope  to  the  anxious  cowboy. 

The  latter  swiftly  adjusted  the  halter  with  a  turn 


io6  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

of  chain  between  the  jaws.  But  Paula,  still  astride, 
leaned  forward,  imperiously  took  the  lead-part  from 
the  cowboy,  whirled  Mountain  Lad  around  to  face 
Forrest,  and  saluted. 

"  Now  you  will  have  to  go  away,"  she  called. 
*  This  is  our  hen  party,  and  the  stag  public  is  not 
admitted." 

Dick  laughed,  saluted  acknowledgment,  and  led 
the  way  back  through  the  lilacs  to  the  road. 

'  Who  .  .  .  who  was  it?"   Graham  queried. 

"  Paula  —  Mrs.  Forrest  —  the  boy  girl,  the  child 
that  never  grew  up,  the  grittiest  puff  of  rose-dust  that 


was  ever  woman." 


"  My  breath  is  quite  taken  away,"  Graham  said. 
"Do  your  people  do  such  stunts  frequently?" 

"  First  time  she  ever  did  that,"  Forrest  replied. 
'  That  was  Mountain  Lad.  She  rode  him  straight 
down  the  spill-way  —  tobogganed  with  him,  twenty- 
two  hundred  and  forty  pounds  of  him." 

"  Risked  his  neck  and  legs  as  well  as  her  own," 
was  Graham's  comment. 

"  Thirty-five  thousand  dollars'  worth  of  neck  and 
legs,"  Dick  smiled.  "  That's  what  a  pool  of  breed 
ers  offered  me  for  him  last  year  after  he'd  cleaned 
up  the  Coast  with  his  get  as  well  as  himself.  And 
as  for  Paula,  she  could  break  necks  and  legs  at  that 
price  every  day  in  the  year  until  I  went  broke  —  only 
she  doesn't.  She  never  has  accidents." 

"  I  wouldn't  have  given  tuppence  for  her  chance 
if  he'd  turned  over." 

"  But  he  didn't,"  Dick  answered  placidly. 
"  That's  Paula's  luck.  She's  tough  to  kill.  Why, 
I've  had  her  under  shell-fire  where  she  was  actually 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  107 

disappointed  because  she  didn't  get  hit,  or  killed,  or 
near-killed.  Four  batteries  opened  on  us,  shrapnel, 
at  mile-range,  and  we  had  to  cover  half  a  mile  of 
smooth  hill-brow  for  shelter.  I  really  felt  I  was  jus 
tified  in  charging  her  with  holding  back.  She  did 
admit  a  '  trifle.'  We've  been  married  ten  or  a  dozen 
years  now,  and,  d'ye  know,  sometimes  it  seems  to 
me  I  don't  know  her  at  all,  and  that  nobody  knows 
her,  and  that  she  doesn't  know  herself  —  just  the 
same  way  as  you  and  I  can  look  at  ourselves  in  a 
mirror  and  wonder  who  the  devil  we  are  anyway. 
Paula  and  I  have  one  magic  formula:  Damn  the 
expense  when  fun  is  selling.  And  it  doesn't  matter 
whether  the  price  is  in  dollars,  hide,  or  life.  It's 
our  way  and  our  luck.  It  works.  And,  d'ye  know, 
we've  never  been  gouged  on  the  price  yet." 


CHAPTER  X 

IT  was  a  stag  lunch.     As  Forrest  explained,  the 
girls  were  "  hen-partying." 
"  I  doubt  you'll  see  a  soul  of  them  till  four 
o'clock,  when  Ernestine,  that's  one  of  Paula's  sisters, 
is  going  to  wallop  me  at  tennis  —  at  least  so  she's 
threatened  and  pledged." 

And  Graham  sat  through  the  lunch,  where  only 
men  sat,  took  his  part  in  the  conversation  on  breeds 
and  breeding,  learned  much,  contributed  a  mite  from 
his  own  world-experiences,  and  was  unable  to  shake 
from  his  eyes  the  persistent  image  of  his  hostess,  the 
vision  of  the  rounded  and  delicate  white  of  her 
against  the  dark  wet  background  of  the  swimming 
stallion.  And  all  the  afternoon,  looking  over  prize 
Merinos  and  Berkshire  gilts,  continually  that  vision 
burned  up  under  his  eyelids.  Even  at  four,  in  the 
tennis  court,  himself  playing  against  Ernestine,  he 
missed  more  than  one  stroke  because  the  image  of 
the  flying  ball  would  suddenly  be  eclipsed  by  the 
image  of  a  white  marble  figure  of  a  woman  that 
strove  and  clung  on  the  back  of  a  great  horse. 

Graham,  although  an  outlander,  knew  his  Cali 
fornia,  and,  while  every  girl  of  the  swimming  suits 
was  gowned  for  dinner,  was  not  surprised  to  find 
no  man  similarly  accoutered.  Nor  had  he  made 
the  mistake  of  so  being  himself,  despite  the  Big 
House  and  the  magnificent  scale  on  when  it  operated. 

108 


THE  LITTLE  LADY  109 

Between  the  first  and  second  gongs,  all  the  guests 
drifted  into  the  long  dining  room.  Sharp  after  the 
second  gong,  Dick  Forrest  arrived  and  precipitated 
cocktails.  And  Graham  impatiently  waited  the  ap 
pearance  of  the  woman  who  had  worried  his  eyes 
since  noon.  He  was  prepared  for  all  manner  of 
disappointment.  Too  many  gorgeous  stripped 
athletes  had  he  seen  slouched  into  conventional  gar 
menting,  to  expect  too  much  of  the  marvelous  crea 
ture  in  the  white  silken  swimming  suit  when  it  should 
appear  garbed  as  civilized  women  garb. 

He  caught  his  breath  with  an  imperceptible  gasp 
when  she  entered.  She  paused,  naturally,  for  just 
the  right  flash  of  an  instant  in  the  arched  doorway, 
limned  against  the  darkness  behind  her,  the  soft  glow 
of  the  indirect  lighting  full  upon  her.  Graham's 
lips  gasped  apart,  and  remained  apart,  his  eyes  rav 
ished  with  the  beauty  and  surprise  of  her  he  had 
deemed  so  small,  so  fairy-like.  Here  was  no  deli 
cate  midget  of  a  child-woman  or  boy-girl  on  a  stal 
lion,  but  a  grand  lady,  as  only  a  small  woman  can 
be  grand  on  occasion. 

Taller  in  truth  was  she,  as  well  as  in  seeming,  than 
he  had  judged  her,  and  as  finely  proportioned  in  her 
gown  as  in  her  swimming  suit.  He  noted  her  shining 
gold-brown  hair  piled  high;  the  healthy  tinge  of  her 
skin  that  was  clean  and  clear  and  white ;  the  singing 
throat,  full  and  round,  incomparably  set  on  a  healthy 
chest;  and  the  gown,  dull  blue,  a  sort  of  medieval 
thing  with  half-fitting,  half-clinging  body,  with  flow 
ing  sleeves  and  trimmings  of  gold-jeweled  bands. 

She  smiled  an  embracing  salutation  and  greeting. 
Graham  recognized  it  as  kin  to  the  one  he  had  seen 


no  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

when  she  smiled  from  the  back  of  the  stallion. 
When  she  started  forward,  he  could  not  fail  to  see 
the  inimitable  way  she  carried  the  cling  and  weight 
ofJier  draperies  with  her  knees  —  round  knees,  he 
,knew,  that  he  had  seen  press  desperately  into  the 
ij^ound  muscle-pads  of  Mountain  Lad.  Graham  ob- 
,  also,  that  she  neither  wore  nor  needed  cor- 

ting.  Nor  could  he  fail,  as  she  crossed  the  floor, 
to  see  two  women:  one,  the  grand  lady,  the  mistress 
of  the  Big  House ;  one,  the  lovely  equestrienne  statue 
beneath  the  dull-blue,  golden-trimmed  gown,  that  no 
gowning  could  ever  make  his  memory  forget. 

She  was  upon  them,  among  them,  and  Graham's 
hand  held  hers  in  the  formal  introduction  as  he  was 
made  welcome  to  the  Big  House  and  all  the  hacienda 
in  a  voice  that  he  knew  was  a  singing  voice  and  that 
could  proceed  only  from  a  throat  that  pillared,  such 
as  hers,  from  a  chest  deep  as  hers  despite  her  small- 
ness. 

At  table,  across  the  corner  from  her,  he  could  not 
help  a  surreptitious  studying  of  her.  While  he  held 
his  own  in  the  general  fun  and  foolishness,  it  was  his 
hostess  that  mostly  filled  the  circle  of  his  eye  and 
the  content  of  his  mind. 

It  was  as  bizarre  a  company  as  Graham  had  ever 
sat  down  to  dinner  with.  The  sheep-buyer  and  the 
correspondent  for  the  Breeders'  Gazette  were  still 
guests.  Three  machine-loads  of  men,  women,  and 
girls,  totaling  fourteen,  had  arrived  shortly  before 
the  first  gong  and  had  remained  to  ride  home  in  the 
moonlight.  Graham  could  not  remember  their 
names;  but  he  made  out  that  they  came  from  some 
valley  town  thirty  miles  away  called  Wickenberg, 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  in 

and  that  they  were  of  the  small-town  banking,  pro 
fessional,  and  wealthy- farmer  class.  They  were  full 
of  spirits,  laughter,  and  the  latest  jokes  and  catches 
sprung  in  the  latest  slang. 

"  I  see  right  now,"  Graham  told  Paula,  "  if  your 
place  continues  to  be  the  caravanserai  which  it  has 
been  since  my  arrival,  that  I  might  as  well  give  up 
trying  to  remember  names  and  people." 

"  I  don't  blame  you,"  she  laughed  concurrence. 
"  But  these  are  neighbors.  They  drop  in  any  time. 
Mrs.  Watson,  there,  next  to  Dick,  is  of  the  old  land- 
aristocracy.  Her  grandfather,  Wicken,  came  across 
the  Sierras  in  1846.  Wickenberg  is  named  after 
him.  And  that  pretty  dark-eyed  girl  is  her  daugh 
ter.  .  .  ." 

And  while  Paula  gave  him  a  running  sketch  of  the 
chance  guests,  Graham  heard  scarce  half  she  said, 
so  occupied  was  he  in  trying  to  sense  his  way  to  an 
understanding  of  her.  Naturalness  was  her  key 
note,  was  his  first  judgment.  In  not  many  moments 
he  had  decided  that  her  key-note  was  joy.  But  he 
was  dissatisfied  with  both  conclusions,  and  knew  he 
had  not  put  his  finger  on  her.  And  then  it  came  to 
him  —  pride.  That  was  it!  It  was  in  her  eye,  in 
the  poise  of  her  head,  in  the  curling  tendrils  of  her 
hair,  in  her  sensitive  nostrils,  in  the  mobile  lips,  in 
the  very  pitch  and  angle  of  the  rounded  chin,  in  her 
hands,  small,  muscular  and  veined,  that  he  knew  at 
sight  to  be  the  hard-worked  hands  of  one  who  had 
spent  long  hours  at  the  piano.  Pride  it  was,  in  every 
muscle,  nerve,  and  quiver  of  her  —  conscious,  sen 
tient,  stinging  pride. 

She  might  be  joyous  and  natural*  boy  arid  woman, 


ii2  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

fun  and  frolic;  but  always  the  pride  was  there,  vi 
brant,  tense,  intrinsic,  the  basic  stuff  of  which  she  was 
milded.  She  was  a  woman,  frank,  outspoken, 
straight-looking,  plastic,  democratic;  but  toy  she  was 
not.  At  times,  to  him^jshe  seemed  to  glint  an  i 
--pression^pf^steeT —  thmT^ew^l-like  steel, 
seerftttTstrength  in  its  most  delicate  tera&s  andj^rftri 
He  fondled  the  impression  of  her  as  oFsilverspun 
wire,  of  fine  leather,  of  twisted  hair-sennit  from  the 
heads  of  maidens  such  as  the  Marquesans  make,  of 
carven  pearl-shell  for  the  lure  of  the  bonita,  and  of 
barbed  ivory  at  the  heads  of  sea-spears  such  as  the 
Eskimos  throw. 

"  All  right,  Aaron,"  they  heard  Dick  Forrest's 
voice  rising,  in  a  lull,  from  the  other  end  of  the 
table.  "  Here's  something  from  Phillips  Brooks 
for  you  to  chew  on.  Brooks  said  that  no  man  '  has 
come  to  true  greatness  who  has  not  felt  in  some  de 
gree  that  his  life  belongs  to  his  race,  and  that  what 
God  gives  him,  he  gives  him  for  mankind/  ' 

"So  at  last  you  believe  in  God?"  the  man,  ad 
dressed  Aaron,  genially  sneered  back.  He  was  a 
slender,  long-faced  olive-brunette,  with  brilliant  black 
eyes  and  the  blackest  of  long  black  beards. 

"  I'm  hanged  if  I  know,"  Dick  answered.  "  Any 
way,  I  quoted  only  figuratively.  Call  it  morality, 
call  it  good,  call  it  evolution." 

"  A  man  doesn't  have  to  be  intellectually  correct 
in  order  to  be  great,"  intruded  a  quiet,  long-faced 
Irishman,  whose  sleeves  were  threadbare  and  frayed. 
"  And  by  the  same  token  many  men  who  are  most 
correct  in  sizing  up  the  universe  have  been  least 
great." 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  113 

"  True  for  you,  Terrence,"  Dick  applauded. 

"  It's  a  matter  of  definition/'  languidly  spoke  up 
an  unmistakable  Hindoo,  crumbling  his  bread  with 
exquisitely  slender  and  small-boned  fingers.  '  What 
shall  we  mean  as  great?  " 

"Shall  we  say  beauty?"  softly  queried  a  tragic- 
faced  youth,  sensitive  and  shrinking,  crowned  with 
an  abominably  trimmed  head  of  long  hair. 

Ernestine  rose  suddenly  at  her  place,  hands  on 
table,  leaning  forward  with  a  fine  simulation  of  in 
tensity. 

"  They're  off !  "  she  cried.  "  They're  off !  Now 
we'll  have  the  universe  settled  all  over  again  for  the 
thousandth  time.  Theodore " — to  the  youthful 
poet — "  it's  a  poor  start.  Get  into  the  running. 
Ride  your  father  ion  and  your  mother  ion,  and  you'll 
finish  three  lengths  ahead." 

A  roar  of  laughter  was  her  reward,  and  the  poet 
blushed  and  receded  into  his  sensitive  shell. 

Ernestine  turned  on  the  black-bearded  one: 

"  Now,  Aaron.  He's  not  in  form.  You  start 
it.  You  know  how.  Begin:  '  As  Bergson  so  well 
has  said,  with  the  utmost  refinement  of  philosophic 
speech  allied  with  the  most  comprehensive  intellectual 
outlook  that  .  .  .'  " 

More  laughter  roared  down  the  table,  drowning 
Ernestine's  conclusion  as  well  as  the  laughing  retort 
of  the  black-bearded  one. 

"  Our  philosophers  won't  have  a  chance  to-night," 
Paula  stole  in  an  aside  to  Graham. 

"Philosophers?"  he  questioned  back.  "They 
didn't  come  with  the  Wickenberg  crowd.  Who  and 
what  are  they?  I'm  all  at  sea." 


V 

n4   -      \/  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"They—"  Paula  hesitated.  "They  live  here. 
They  call  themselves  the  jungle-birds.  They  have 
a  camp  in  the  woods  a  couple  of  miles  away,  where 
they  never  do  anything  except  read  and  talk.  I'll 
wager,  right  now,  you'll  find  fifty  of  Dick'^  latest, 
uncatalogued  books  in  their  cabins,  They  ha've  the 
run  of  the  library,  as  well,  and  you'll  see  them  drift 
ing  in  and  out,  'any  time  of  the  day  or  night,  with 
their  arms  full  of  books  —  also,  the  latest  maga 
zines.  Dick  says  they  are  responsible  for  his  pos 
sessing  the  most  exhaustive  and  up-to-date  library 
on  philosophy  on  the  Pacific  Coast.  In  a  way,  they 
sort  of  digest  such  things  for  him.  It's  great  fun 
for  Dick,  and,  besides,  it  saves  him  time.  He's  a 
dreadfully  hard  worker,  you  know." 

"  I  understand  that  they  .  .  .  that  Dick  takes  care 
of  them?  "  Graham  asked,  the  while  he  pleasured  in 
looking  straight  into  the  blue  eyes  that  looked  so 
straight  into  his. 

As  she  answered,  he  was  occupied  with  noting  the 
faintest  hint  of  bronze  —  perhaps  a  trick  of  the  light 
—  in  her  long,  brown  lashes.  Perforce*,  he  lifted 
his  gaze  to  her  eyebrows,  brown>  delicately  stenciled, 
and  made  sure  that  the  hint  of  bronze  wa*  there. 
Still  lifting  his  gaze  to  her  high-piled  hair,  he  again 
saw,  but  more  pronounced,  the  bronze  note  gifting 
from  the  brown-golden  hair.  Nor  did  he  fail  to 
startle  and  thrill  to  a  dazzlement  of  smile  and  teeth 
and  eye  that  frequently  lived  its  life  in  her  face. 
Hers  was  no  thin  smile  of  restraint,  he  judged. 
When  she  smiled  she  smiled  all  of  herself,  gener 
ously,  joyously,  throwing  the  largess  of  all  her  being 
into  the  natural  expression  of  what  was  herself  and 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  115 

which  domiciled  somewhere  within  that  pretty  head 
of  hers. 

u  Yes,'1  she  was  saying.  u  They  have  never  to 
worry,  as  long  as  they  live,  over  mere  bread  and 
butter.  Dick  is  most  generous,  and,  rather  immoral, 
in  his  encouragement  of  idleness  on  the  part  of  men 
like  them.  It's  a  funny  place,  as  you'll  find  out  until 
you  come  to  understand  us.  They  .  .  .  they  are 
appurtenances,  and  —  and  hereditaments,  and  such 
things.  They  will  be  with  us  always  until  we  bury 
them  or  they  bury  us.  Once  in  a  while  one  or  an 
other  of  them  drifts  away  —  for  a  time.  Like  the 
cat,  you  know.  Then  it  costs  Dick  real  money  to 
get  them  back.  Terrence,  there  —  Terrence  Mc- 
Fane  —  he's  an  epicurean  anarchist,  if  you  know 
what  that  means.  He  wouldn't  kill  a  flea.  He  has 
a  pet  cat  I  gave  him,  a  Persian  of  the  bluest  blue,  and 
he  carefully  picks  her  fleas,  not  injuring  them,  stores 
them  in  a  vial,  and  turns  them  loose  in  the  forest  on 
his  long  walks  when  he  tires  of  human  companionship 
and  communes  with  nature. 

"  Well,  only  last  year,  he  got  a  bee  in  his  bonnet 
—  the  alphabet.  He  started  for  Egypt  —  without 
a  cent,  of  course  —  to  run  the  alphabet  down  in  the 
home  of  its  origin  and  thereby  to  win  the  formula 
that  would  explain  the  cosmos.  He  got  as  far  as 
Denver,  traveling  as  tramps  travel,  when  he  mixed 
up  in  some  I.  W.  W.  riot  for  free  speech  or  some 
thing.  Dick  had  to  hire  lawyers,  pay  fines,  and  do 
just  about  everything  to  get  him  safe  home  again. 

"  And  the  one  with  a  beard  —  Aaron  Hancock. 
Like  Terrence,  he  won't  work.  Aaron's  a  South 
erner.  Says  none  of  his  people  ever  did  work,  and 


n6  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

that  there  have  always  been  peasants  and  fools  who 
just  couldn't  be  restrained  from  working.  That's 
why  he  wears  a  beard.  To  shave,  he  holds,  is  un 
necessary  work,  and,  therefore,  immoral.  I  remem 
ber,  at  Melbourne,  when  he  broke  in  upon  Dick  and 
me,  a  sunburnt  wild  man  from  out  the  Australian 
bush.  It  seems  he'd  been  making  original  researches 
in  anthropology,  or  folk-lore-ology,  or  something  like 
that.  Dick  had  known  him  years  before  in  Paris, 
and  Dick  assured  him,  if  he  ever  drifted  back  to 
America,  of  food  and  shelter.  So  here  he  is." 

u  And  the  poet?"  Graham  asked,  glad  that  she 
must  still  talk  for  a  while,  enabling  him  to  study  the 
quick  dazzlement  of  smile  that  played  upon  her  face. 

"  Oh,  Theo  —  Theodore  Malken,  though  we 
call  him  Leo.  He  won't  work,  either.  His  peo 
ple  are  old  Californian  stock  and  dreadfully  wealthy; 
but  they  disowned  him  and  he  disowned  them  when 
he  was  fifteen.  They  say  he  is  lunatic,  and  he  says 
they  are  merely  maddening.  He  really  writes  some 
remarkable  verse  .  .  .  when  he  does  write;  but  he 
prefers  to  dream  and  live  in  the  jungle  with  Terrence 
and  Aaron.  He  was  tutoring  immigrant  Jews  in  San 
Francisco,  when  Terrence  and  Aaron  rescued  him, 
or  captured  him,  I  don't  know  which.  He's  been 
with  us  two  years  now,  and  he's  actually  filling  out, 
despite  the  facts  that  Dick  is  absurdly  generous  in 
furnishing  supplies  and  that  they'd  rather  talk  and 
read  and  dream  than  cook.  The  only  good  meals 
they  get  is  when  they  descend  upon  us,  like  to-night." 

"And  the  Hindoo,  there  —  who's  he?" 

"  That's  Dar  Hyal.  He's  their  guest.  The  three 
of  them  invited  him  up,  just  as  Aaron  first  invited 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  117 

T'errence,  and  as  Aaron  and  Terrence  invited  Leo. 
Dick  says,  in  time,  three  more  are  bound  to  appear, 
and  then  he'll  have  his  Seven  Sages  of  the  Madrono 
Grove.  Their  jungle  camp  is  in  a  madrono  grove, 
you  know.  It's  a  most  beautiful  spot,  with  living 
springs,  a  canyon  —  but  I  was  telling  you  about  Dar 
Hyal. 

"  He's  a  revolutionist,  of  sorts.  He's  dabbled  in 
our  universities,  studied  in  France,  Italy,  Switzer 
land,  is  a  political  refugee  from  India,  and  he's 
hitched  his  wagon  to  two  stars :  one,  a  new  synthetic 
system  of  philosophy;  the  other,  rebellion  against 
the  tyranny  of  British  rule  in  India.  He  advocates 
individual  terrorism  and  direct  mass  action.  That's 
why  his  paper,  Kadar,  or  Badar,  or  something  like 
that,  was  suppressed  here  in  California,  and  why  he 
narrowly  escaped  being  deported;  and  that's  why  he's 
up  here  just  now,  devoting  himself  to  formulating 
his  philosophy. 

"  He  and  Aaron  quarrel  tremendously  —  that  is, 
on  philosophical  matters.  And  now — "  Paula 
sighed  and  erased  the  sigh  with  her  smile  — "  and 
now,  I'm  done.  Consider  yourself  acquainted. 
And,  oh,  if  you  encounter  our  sages  more  intimately, 
a  word  of  warning,  especially  if  the  encounter  be  in 
the  stag  room:  Dar  Hyal  is  a  total  abstainer;  Theo 
dore  Malken  can  get  poetically  drunk,  and  usually 
does,  on  one  cocktail;  Aaron  Hancock  is  an  expert 
wine-bibber;  and  Terrence  McFane,  knowing  little 
of  one  drink  from  another,  and  caring  less,  can  put 
ninety-nine  men  out  of  a  hundred  under  the  table  and 
go  right  on  lucidly  expounding  epicurean  anarchy." 

One  thing  Graham  noted  as  the  dinner  proceeded. 


n8  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

The  sages  called  Dick  Forrest  by  his  first  name ;  but 
they  always  addressed  Paula  as  "  Mrs.  Forrest," 
although  she  called  them  by  their  first  names.  There 
was  nothing  affected  about  it.  Quite  unconsciously 
did  they,  who  respected  few  things  under  the  sun, 
and  among  such  few  things  not  even  work  —  quite 
unconsciously,  and  invariably,  did  they  recognize  the 
certain  definite  aloofness  in  Dick  Forrest's  wife  so 
that  her  given  name  was  alien  to  their  lips.  By  such 
>kens  Evan  Graham  was  not  slow  in  learning  that 
>ick  Forrest's  wife  had  a  way  with  her,  compounded 
)f  sheerest  democracy  and  equally  sheer  royalty. 
\It  was  the  same  thing,  after  dinner,  in  the  big 
living  room.  She  dared  as  she  pleased,  but  nobody 
assumed.  Before  the  company  settled  down,  Paula 
seemed  everywhere,  bubbling  over  with  more  out 
rageous  spirits  than  any  of  them.  From  this  group 
or  that,  from  one  corner  or  another,  her  laugh  rang 
out.  And  her  laugh  fascinated  Graham.  There 
was  a  fibrous  thrill  in  it,  most  sweet  to  the  ear,  that 
differentiated  it  from  any  laugh  he  had  ever  heard. 
It  caused  Graham  to  lose  the  thread  of  young  Mr. 
Wombold's  contention  that  what  California  needed 
was  not  a  Japanese  exclusion  law  but  at  least  two  hun 
dred  thousand  Japanese  coolies  to  do  the  farm  labor 
of  California  and  knock  in  the  head  the  threatened 
eight-hour  day  for  agricultural  laborers.  Young 
Mr.  Wombold,  Graham  gleaned,  was  an  hereditary 
large  land-owner  in  the  vicinity  of  Wickenberg  who 
prided  himself  on  not  yielding  to  the  trend  of  the 
times  by  becoming  an  absentee  landlord. 

From  the  piano,   where  Eddie   Mason  was  the 
center  of  a  group  of  girls,  came  much  noise  of  rag- 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  119 

time  music  and  slangtime  song.  Terrence  McFane 
and  Aaron  Hancock  fell  into  a  heated  argument  over 
the  music  of  futurism.  And  Graham  was  saved 
from  the  Japanese  situation  with  Mr.  Wombold  by 
Dar  Hyal,  who  proceeded  to  proclaim  Asia  for  the 
Asiatics  and  California  for  the  Californians. 

Paula,  catching  up  her  skirts  for  speed,  fled  down 
the  room  in  some  romp,  pursued  by  Dick,  who  cap 
tured  her  as  she  strove  to  dodge  around  the  Wom 
bold  group. 

"  Wicked  woman,"  Dick  reproved  her  in  mock 
wrath;  and,  the  next  moment,  joined  her  in  persuad 
ing  Dar  Hyal  to  dance. 

And  Dar  Hyal  succumbed,  flinging  Asia  and  the 
Asiatics  to  the  winds,  along  with  his  arms  and  legs, 
as  he  weirdly  parodied  the  tango  in  what  he  declared 
to  be  the  "  blastic  "  culmination  of  modern  dancing. 

"  And  now,  Red  Cloud,  sing  Mr.  Graham  your 
Acorn  Song,"  Paula  commanded  Dick. 

Forrest,  his  arm  still  about  her,  detaining  her  for 
the  threatened  punishment  not  yet  inflicted,  shook 
his  head  somberly. 

"  The  Acorn  Song!"  Ernestine  called  from  the 
piano;  and  the  cry  was  taken  up  by  Eddie  Mason 
and  the  girls. 

"  Oh,  do,  Dick,"  Paula  pleaded.  "  Mr.  Graham 
is  the  only  one  who  hasn't  heard  it." 

Dick  shook  his  head. 

"*  Then  sing  him  your  Goldfish  Song." 

"  I'll  sing  him  Mountain  Lad's  song,"  Dick  bull 
ied,  a  whimsical  sparkle  in  his  eyes.  He  stamped  his 
feet,  pranced,  nickered  a  not  bad  imitation  of  Moun 
tain  Lad,  tossed  an  imaginary  mane,  and  cried : 


120  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  Hear  me !     I  am  Eros  I     I  stamp  upon  the  hills !  " 

'  The  Acorn  Song,"  Paula  interrupted  quickly  and 
quietly,  with  just  the  hint  of  steel  in  her  voice. 

Dick  obediently  ceased  his  chant  of  Mountain  Lad, 
but  shook  his  head  like  a  stubborn  colt. 

"  I  have  a  new  song,"  he  said  solemnly.  "  It  is  about 
you  and  me,  Paula.  I  got  it  from  the  Nishinam." 

4  The  Nishinam  are  the  extinct  aborigines  of  this 
part  of  California,"  Paula  shot  in  a  swift  aside  of 
explanation  to  Graham. 

Dick  danced  half  a  dozen  steps,  stiff-legged,  as 
Indians  dance,  slapped  his  thighs  with  his  palms,  and 
began  a  new  chant,  still  retaining  his  hold  on  his  wife. 

"  Me,  I  am  Ai-kut,  the  first  man  of  the  Nishinam. 
Ai-kut  is  the  short  for  Adam,  and  my  father  and  my 
mother  were  the  coyote  and  the  moon.  And  this  is 
Yo-to-to-wi,  my  wife.  She  is  the  first  woman  of  the 
Nishinam.  Her  father  and  her  mother  were  the 
grasshopper  and  the  ring-tailed  cat.  They  were  the 
best  father  and  mother  left  after  my  father  and 
mother.  The  coyote  is  very  wise,  the  moon  is  very 
old;  but  who  ever  heard  much  of  anything  of  credit 
to  the  grasshopper  and  the  ring-tailed  cat?  The 
Nishinam  are  always  right.  The  mother  of  all 
women  had  to  be  a  cat,  a  little,  wizened,  sad-faced, 
shrewd  ring-tailed  cat." 

Whereupon  the  song  of  the  first  man  and  woman 
was  interrupted  by  protests  from  the  women  and  ac 
clamations  from  the  men. 

"  This  is  Yo-to-to-wi,  which  is  the  short  for  Eve," 
Dick  chanted  on,  drawing  Paula  bruskly  closer  to 
his  side  with  a  semblance  of  savage  roughness. 
"  Yo-to-to-wi  is  not  much  to  look  at.  But  be  not 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  121 

hard  upon  her.  The  fault  is  with  the  grasshopper 
and  the  ring-tailed  cat.  Me,  I  am  Ai-kut,  the  first 
man;  but  question  not  my  taste.  I  was  the  first 
man,  and  this,  I  saw,  was  the  first  woman.  Where 
there  is  but  one  choice,  there  is  not  much  to  choose. 
Adam  was  so  circumstanced.  He  chose  Eve.  Yo- 
to-to-wi  was  the  one  woman  in  all  the  world  for  me, 
so  I  chose  Yo-to-to-wi." 

And  Evan  Graham,  listening,  his  eyes  on  that 
possessive,  encircling  arm  of  all  his  hostess's  fairness, 
felt  an  awareness  of  hurt,  and  arose  unsummoned  the 
thought,  to  be  dismissed  angrily,  "  Dick  Forrest  is 
lucky  —  too  lucky." 

"  Me,  I  am  Ai-kut,"  Dick  chanted  on.  "  This 
is  my  dew  of  woman.  She  is  my  honey-dew  of 
woman.  I  have  lied  to  you.  Her  father  and  her 
mother  were  neither  hopper  nor  cat.  They  were  the 
Sierra  dawn  and  the  summer  east  wind  of  the  moun 
tains.  Together  they  conspired,  and  from  the  air 
and  earth  they  sweated  all  sweetness  till  in  a  mist 
of  their  own  love  the  leaves  of  the  chaparral  and 
the  manzanita  were  dewed  with  the  honey-dew. 

"  Yo-to-to-wi  is  my  honey-dew  woman.  Hear  me  ! 
I  am  Ai-kut.  Yo-to-to-wi  is  my  quail  woman,  my 
deer-woman,  my  lush-woman  of  all  soft  rain  and  fat 
soil.  She  was  born  of  the  thin  starlight  and  the 
brittle  dawn-light  before  the  sun  .  .  . 

"  And,"  Forrest  concluded,  relapsing  into  his  nat 
ural  voice  and  enunciation,  having  reached  the  limit 
of  extemporization, — "  and  if  you  think  old,  sweet, 
blue-eyed  Solomon  has  anything  on  me  in  singing  the 
Song  of  Songs,  just  put  your  names  down  for  the  sub 
scription  edition  of  my  Song  of  Songs." 


CHAPTER  XI 

IT  was  Mrs.  Mason  who  first  asked  that  Paula 
play;  but  it  was  Terrence  McFane  and  Aaron 
Hancock  who  evicted  the  rag-time  group  from 
the  piano  and  sent  Theodore  Malken,  a  blushing  am 
bassador,  to  escort  Paula. 

'Tis  for  the  confounding  of  this  pagan  that  I'm 
askin'   you   to   play  '  Reflections   on  the  Water,'  ' 
Graham  heard  Terrence  say  to  her. 

"  And  '  The  Girl  with  Flaxen  Hair/  after,  please," 
begged  Hancock,  the  indicted  pagan.  "  It  will  aptly 
prove  my  disputation.  This  wild  Celt  has  a  bog- 
theory  of  music  that  predates  the  cave-man  —  and 
he  has  the  unadulterated  stupidity  to  call  himself 
ultra-modern." 

uOh,  Debussy!"  Paula  laughed.  "Still  wran 
gling  over  him,  eh?  I'll  try  and  get  around  to  him. 
But  I  don't  know  with  what  I'll  begin." 

Dar  Hyal  joined  the  three  sages  in  seating  Paula 
at  the  concert  grand  which,  Graham  decided,  was 
none  too  great  for  the  great  room.  But  no  sooner 
was  she  seated  than  the  three  sages  slipped  away  to 
what  were  evidently  their  chosen  listening  places. 
The  young  poet  stretched  himself  prone  on  a  deep 
bearskin  forty  feet  from  the  piano,  his  hands  buried 
in  his  hair.  Terrence  and  Aaron  lolled  into  a  cush 
ioned  embrasure  of  a  window  seat,  sufficiently  near 

122 


THE  LITTLE  LADY  123 

to  each  other  to  nudge  the  points  of  their  respective 
contentions  as  Paula  might  expound  them.  The 
girls  were  huddled  in  colored  groups  on  wide  couches 
or  garlanded  in  twos  and  threes  on  and  in  the  big 
koa-wood  chairs. 

Evan  Graham  half-started  forward  to  take  the 
honor  of  turning  Paula's  music,  but  saw  in  time  that 
Dar  Hyal  had  already  elected  to  himself  that  office. 
Graham  glimpsed  the  scene  with  quiet  curious 
glances.  The  grand  piano,  under  a  low  arch  at 
the  far-end  of  the  room,  was  cunningly  raised 
and  placed  as  on  and  in  a  sounding  board.  All 
jollity  and  banter  had  ceased.  Evidently,  he 
thought,  the  Little  Lady  had  a  way  with  her  and 
was  accepted  as  a  player  of  parts.  And  from  this 
he  was  perversely  prepared  for  disappointment. 

Ernestine  leaned  across  from  a  chair  to  whis 
per  to  him: 

"  She  can  do  anything  she  wants  to  do.  And  she 
doesn't  work  .  .  .  much.  She  studied  under 
Leschetizky  and  Madame  Carrefio,  you  know,  and 
she  abides  by  their  methods.  She  doesn't  play  like 
a  woman,  either.  Listen  to  that!  " 

Graham  knew  that  he  expected  disappointment 
from  her  confident  hands,  even  as  she  rippled  them 
over  the  keys  in  little  chords  and  runs  with  which 
he  could  not  quarrel  but  which  he  had  heard  too 
often  before  from  technically  brilliant  but  musically 
mediocre  performers.  But  whatever  he  might  have 
fancied  she  would  play,  he  was  all  unprepared  for 
Rachmaninoff's  sheerly  masculine  Prelude,  which  he 
had  heard  only  men  play  when  decently  played. 

She  took  hold  of  the  piano,  with  the  first  two  ring- 


i24  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

ing  bars,  masterfully,  like  a  man;  she  seemed  to  lift 
it,  and  its  sounding  wires,  with  her  two  hands,  with 
the  strength  and  certitude  of  maleness.  And  then, 
as  only  he  had  heard  men  do  it,  she  sank,  or  leaped  — 
he  could  scarcely  say  which  —  to  the  sureness  and 
pureness  and  ineffable  softness  of  the  Andante  fol 
lowing. 

She  played  on,  with  the  calm  and  power  of  any 
thing  but  the  little,  almost  girlish  woman  he  glimpsed 
through  half-closed  lids  across  the  ebony  board  of 
the  enormous  piano,  which  she  commanded,  as  she 
commanded  herself,  as  she  commanded  the  composer. 
Her  touch  was  definite,  authoritative,  was  his  judg 
ment,  as  the  Prelude  faded  away  in  dying  chords 
hauntingly  reminiscent  of  its  full  vigor  that  seemed 
still  to  linger  in  the  air. 

While  Aaron  and  Terrence  debated  in  excited 
whispers  in  the  window  seat,  and  while  Dar  Hyal 
sought  other  music  at  Paula's  direction,  she  glanced 
at  Dick,  who  turned  off  bowl  after  bowl  of  mellow 
light  till  Paula  sat  in  an  oasis  of  soft  glow  that 
brought  out  the  dull  gold  lights  in  her  dress  and  hair. 

Graham  watched  the  lofty  room  grow  loftier  in 
the  increasing  shadows.  Eighty  feet  in  length,  rising 
two  stories  and  a  half  from  masonry  walls  to  tree- 
trunked  roof,  flung  across  with  a  flying  gallery  from 
the  rail  of  which  hung  skins  of  wild  animals,  hand- 
woven  blankets  of  Oaxaca  and  Ecuador,  and  tapas, 
woman-pounded  and  vegetable-dyed,  from  the  islands 
of  the  South  Pacific,  Graham  knew  it  for  what  it  was 
—  a  feast-hall  of  some  medieval  castle ;  and  almost 
he  felt  a  poignant  sense  of  lack  of  the  long  spread 
table,  with  pewter  below  the  salt  and  silver  above  the 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  125 

salt,  and  with  huge  hound-dogs  scuffling  beneath  for 
bones. 

Later,  when  Paula  had  played  sufficient  Debussy 
to  equip  Terrence  and  Aaron  for  fresh  war,  Graham 
talked  with  her  about  music  for  a  few  vivid  moments. 
So  well  did  she  prove  herself  aware  of  the  philoso 
phy  of  music,  that,  ere  he  knew  it,  he  was  seduced 
into  voicing  his  own  pet  theory. 

"  And  so,"  he  concluded,  "  the  true  psychic  factor 
of  music  took  nearly  three  thousand  years  to  impress 
itself  on  the  Western  mind.  Debussy  more  nearly 
attains  the  idea-engendering  and  suggestive  serenity 
—  say  of  the  time  of  Pythagoras  —  than  any  of  his 
fore-runners  — " 

Here,  Paula  put  a  pause  in  his  summary  by  beckon 
ing  over  Terrence  and  Aaron  from  their  battlefield 
in  the  windowseat. 

"  Yes,  and  what  of  it?  "  Terrence  was  demand 
ing,  as  they  came  up  side  by  side.  ;<  I  defy  you, 
Aaron,  I  defy  you,  to  get  one  thought  out  of  Berg- 
son  on  music  that  is  more  lucid  than  any  thought  he 
ever  uttered  in  his  '  Philosophy  of  Laughter,'  which 
is  not  lucid  at  all." 

"  Oh !  —  listen !  "  Paula  cried,  with  sparkling 
eyes.  "  We  have  a  new  prophet.  Hear  Mr.  Gra 
ham.  He's  worthy  of  your  steel,  of  both  your  steel. 
He  agrees  with  you  that  music  is  the  refuge  from 
blood  and  iron  and  the  pounding  of  the  table.  That 
weak  souls,  and  sensitive  souls,  and  high-pitched  souls 
flee  from  the  crassness  and  the  rawness  of  the  world 
to  the  drug-dreams  of  the  over-world  of  rhythm  and 
vibration  — " 

"  Atavistic!  "    Aaron    Hancock    snorted.     "  The 


126  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

cave-men,  the  monkey-folk,  and  the  ancestral  bog- 
men  of  Terrence  did  that  sort  of  thing — " 

"  But  wait,"  Paula  urged.  u  It's  his  conclusions 
and  methods  and  processes.  Also,  there  he  dis 
agrees  with  you,  Aaron,  fundamentally.  He  quoted 
Pater's  '  that  all  art  aspires  toward  music  ' — " 

u  Pure  prehuman  and  micro-organic  chemistry," 
Aaron  broke  in.  "  The  reactions  of  cell-elements  to 
the  doggerel  punch  of  the  wave-lengths  of  sunlight, 
the  foundation  of  all  folk-songs  and  rag-times. 
Terrence  completes  his  circle  right  there  and  stultifies 
all  his  windiness.  Now  listen  to  me,  and  I  will  pre 
sent  — " 

"  But  wait,"  Paula  pleaded.  "  Mr.  Graham  ar 
gues  that  English  puritanism  barred  music,  real 
music,  for  centuries.  .  .  ." 

'  True,"  said  Terrence. 

"  And  that  England  had  to  win  to  its  sensuous  de 
light  in  rhythm  through  Milton  and  Shelley  — " 

'  Who  was  a  metaphysician,"  Aaron  broke  in. 

"  A  lyrical  metaphysician,"  Terrence  defined  in 
stantly.  "  That  you  must  acknowledge,  Aaron." 

"  And  Swinburne?  "  Aaron  demanded,  with  a  sig 
nificance  that  tokened  former  arguments. 

"  He  says  Offenbach  was  the  fore-runner  of  Ar 
thur  Sullivan,"  Paula  cried  challengingly.  "  And 
that  Auber  was  before  Offenbach.  And  as  for  Wag 
ner,  ask  him,  just  ask  him  — " 

And  she  slipped  away,  leaving  Graham  to  his  fate. 
He  watched  her,  watched  the  perfect  knee-lift  of  her 
draperies  as  she  crossed  to  Mrs.  Mason  and  set  about 
arranging  bridge  quartets,  while  dimly  he  could  hear 
Terrence  beginning: 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  127 

"  It  is  agreed  that  music  was  the  basis  of  inspira 
tion  of  all  the  arts  of  the  Greeks.  .  .  ." 

Later,  when  the  two  sages  were  obliviously  en 
grossed  in  a  heated  battle  as  to  whether  Berlioz  or 
Beethoven  had  exposited  in  their  compositions  the 
deeper  intellect,  Graham  managed  his  escape. 
Clearly,  his  goal  was  to  find  his  hostess  again.  But 
she  had  joined  two  of  the  girls  in  the  whispering, 
giggling  seclusiveness  of  one  of  the  big  chairs,  and, 
most  of  the  company  being  deep  in  bridge,  Graham 
found  himself  drifted  into  a  group  composed  of  Dick 
Forrest,  Mr.  Wombold,  Dar  Hyal,  and  the  cor 
respondent  of  the  Breeders'  Gazette. 

"  I'm  sorry  you  won't  be  able  to  run  over  with 
me,"  Dick  was  saying  to  the  correspondent.  "  It 
would  mean  only  one  more  day.  I'll  take  you  to 


morrow." 


"  Sorry,"  was  the  reply.  "  But  I  must  make  Santa 
Rosa.  Burbank  has  promised  me  practically  a  whole 
morning,  and  you  know  what  that  means.  Yet  I 
know  the  Gazette  would  be  glad  for  an  account  of 
the  experiment.  Can't  you  outline  it?  --  briefly,  just 
briefly?  Here's  Mr.  Graham.  It  will  interest 
him,  I  am  sure." 

"  More  water-works?"  Graham  queried. 

"No;  an  asinine  attempt  to  make  good  farmers 
out  of  hopelessly  poor  ones,"  Mr.  Wombold  an 
swered.  "  I  contend  that  any  farmer  to-day  who 
has  no  land  of  his  own,  proves  by  his  lack  of  it  that 
he  is  an  inefficient  farmer." 

"  On  the  contrary,"  spoke  up  Dar  Hyal,  weaving 
his  slender  Asiatic  fingers  in  the  air  to  emphasize 
his  remarks.  "  Quite  on  the  contrary.  Times  have 


128  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

changed.  Efficiency  no  longer  implies  the  posses 
sion  of  capital.  It  is  a  splendid  experiment,  an 
heroic  experiment.  And  it  will  succeed." 

"What   is   it,    Dick?"    Graham   urged.     "Tell 


us." 


"  Oh,  nothing,  just  a  white  chip  on  the  table,"  For 
rest  answered  lightly.  "  Most  likely  it  will  never 
come  to  anything,  although  just  the  same  I  have  my 
hopes  — " 

"  A  white  chip !  "  Wombold  broke  in.  "  Five 
thousand  acres  of  prime  valley  land,  all  for  a  lot  of 
failures  to  batten  on,  to  farm,  if  you  please,  on  salary, 
with  food  thrown  in!  " 

"  The  food  that  is  grown  on  the  land  only,"  Dick 
corrected.  "  Now  I  will  have  to  put  it  straight. 
I've  set  aside  five  thousand  acres  midway  between 
here  and  the  Sacramento  River." 

u  Think  of  the  alfalfa  it  grew,  and  that  you  need," 
Wombold  again  interrupted. 

"  My  dredgers  redeemed  twice  that  acreage  from 
the  marshes  in  the  past  year,"  Dick  replied.  "  The 
thing  is,  I  believe  the  West  and  the  world  must  come 
to  intensive  farming.  I  want  to  do  my  share  toward 
blazing  the  way.  I've  divided  the  five  thousand 
acres  into  twenty-acre  holdings.  I  believe  each 
twenty  acres  should  support,  comfortably,  not  only  a 
family,  but  pay  at  least  six  per  cent." 

"  When  it  is  all  allotted  it  will  mean  two  hundred 
and  fifty  families,"  the  Gazette  man  calculated; 
"  and,  say  five  to  the  family,  it  will  mean  twelve 
hundred  and  fifty  souls." 

u  Not  quite,"  Dick  corrected.  "  The  last  holding 
is  occupied,  and  we  have  only  a  little  over  eleven 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  129 

hundred  on  the  land."  He  smiled  whimsically. 
"  But  they  promise,  they  promise.  Several  fat  years 
and  they'll  average  six  to  the  family." 

"  Who  is  we?"  Graham  inquired. 

"  Oh,  I  have  a  committee  of  farm  experts  on  it- 
my  own  men,  with  the  exception  of  Professor  Lieb, 
whom  the  Federal  Government  has  loaned  me.  The 
thing  is :  they  must  farm,  with  individual  responsibil 
ity,  according  to  the  scientific  methods  embodied  in 
our  instructions.  The  land  is  uniform.  Every 
holding  is  like  a  pea  in  the  pod  to  every  other  hold 
ing.  The  results  of  each  holding  will  speak  in  no 
uncertain  terms.  The  failure  of  any  farmer, 
through  laziness  or  stupidity,  measured  by  the  aver 
age  result  of  the  entire  two  hundred  and  fifty  farm 
ers,  will  not  be  tolerated.  Out  the  failures  must  go, 
convicted  by  the  average  of  their  fellows. 

"  It's  a  fair  deal.  No  farmer  risks  anything. 
With  the  food  he  may  grow  and  he  and  his  family 
may  consume,  plus  a  cash  salary  of  a  thousand  a  year, 
he  is  certain,  good  seasons  and  bad,  stupid  or  intelli 
gent,  of  at  least  a  hundred  dollars  a  month.  The 
stupid  and  the  inefficient  will  be  bound  to  be  elimi 
nated  by  the  intelligent  and  the  efficient.  That's  all. 
It  will  demonstrate  intensive  farming  with  a  ven 
geance.  And  there  is  more  than  the  certain  salary 
guaranty.  After  the  salary  is  paid,  the  adventure 
must  yield  six  per  cent,  to  me.  If  more  than  this  is 
achieved,  then  the  entire  hundred  per  cent,  of  the  ad 
ditional  achievement  goes  to  the  farmer." 

"  Which  means  that  each  farmer  with  go  in  him 
will  work  nights  to  make  good-- I  see,"  said  the 
Gazette  man.  "And  why  not?  Hundred-dollar 


130  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

jobs  aren't  picked  up  for  the  asking.  The  average 
farmer  in  the  United  States  doesn't  net  fifty  a  month 
on  his  own  land,  especially  when  his  wages  of  super 
intendence  and  of  direct  personal  labor  are  sub 
tracted.  Of  course  able  men  will  work  their  heads 
off  to  hold  to  such  a  proposition,  and  they'll  see  to  it 
that  every  member  of  the  family  does  the  same." 

'Tis  the  one  objection  I  have  to  this  place," 
Terrence  McFane,  who  had  just  joined  the  group, 
announced.  "  Ever  one  hears  but  the  one  thing  — 
work.  'Tis  repulsive,  the  thought  of  the  work,  each 
on  his  twenty  acres,  toilin'  and  moilin',  daylight  till 
dark,  and  after  dark  —  an'  for  what?  A  bit  of 
meat,  a  bit  of  bread,  and,  maybe,  a  bit  of  jam  on  the 
bread.  An'  to  what  end?  Is  meat  an'  bread  an' 
jam  the  end  of  it  all,  the  meaning  of  life,  the  goal 
of  existence?  Surely  the  man  will  die,  like  a  work 
horse  dies,  after  a  life  of  toil.  And  what  end  has 
been  accomplished?  Bread  an'  meat  an'  jam?  Is 
that  it?  A  full  belly  and  shelter  from  the  cold  till 
one's  body  drops  apart  in  the  dark  moldiness  of  the 
grave?  " 

"  But,  Terrence,  you,  too,  will  die,"  Dick  Forrest 
retorted. 

"  But,  oh,  my  glorious  life  of  loafing,"  came  the 
instant  answer.  "  The  hours  with  the  stars  and  the 
flowers,  under  the  green  trees  with  the  whisperings 
of  breezes  in  the  grass.  My  books,  my  thinkers 
and  their  thoughts.  Beauty,  music,  all  the  solaces  of 
all  the  arts.  What?  When  I  fade  into  the  dark 
I  shall  have  well  lived  and  received  my  wage  for  liv 
ing.  But  these  twenty-acre  work-animals  of  two- 
legged  men  of  yours!  Daylight  till  dark,  toil  and 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  131 

moil,  sweat  on  the  shirts  on  the  backs  of  them  that 
dries  only  to  crust,  meat  and  bread  in  their  bellies, 
roofs  that  don't  leak,  a  brood  of  youngsters  to  live 
after  them,  to  live  the  same  beast-lives  of  toil,  to  fill 
their  bellies  with  the  same  meat  and  bread,  to  scratch 
their  backs  with  the  same  sweaty  shirts,  and  to  go 
into  the  dark  knowing  only  meat  and  bread,  and, 
mayhap,  a  bit  of  jam." 

"  But  somebody  must  do  the  work  that  enables 
you  to  loaf,"  Mr.  Wombold  spoke  up  indignantly. 

"  'Tis  true,  'tis  sad  'tis  true,"  Terrence  replied 
lugubriously.  Then  his  face  beamed.  "  And  I 
thank  the  good  Lord  for  it,  for  the  work-beasties 
that  drag  and  drive  the  plows  up  and  down  the  fields, 
for  the  bat-eyed  miner-beasties  that  dig  the  coal  and 
gold,  for  all  the  stupid  peasant-beasties  that  keep  my 
hands  soft,  and  give  power  to  fine  fellows  like  Dick 
there,  who  smiles  on  me  and  shares  the  loot  with  me, 
and  buys  the  latest  books  for  me,  and  gives  me  a  place 
at  his  board  that  is  plenished  by  the  two-legged  work- 
beasties,  and  a  place  at  his  fire  that  is  builded  by  the 
same  beasties,  and  a  shack  and  a  bed  in  the  jungle 
under  the  madrono  trees  where  never  work  intrudes 
its  monstrous  head." 

Evan  Graham  was  slow  in  getting  ready  for  bed 
that  night.  He  was  unwontedly  stirred  both  by  the 
Big  House  and  by  the  Little  Lady  who  was  its  mis 
tress.  As  he  sat  on  the  edge  of  the  bed,  half-un 
dressed,  and  smoked  out  a  pipe,  he  kept  seeing  her 
in  memory,  as  he  had  seen  her  in  the  flesh  the  past 
twelve  hours,  in  her  varied  moods  and  guises  —  the 
woman  who  had  talked  music  with  him,  and  who  had 


132  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

expounded  music  to  him  to  his  delight;  who  had  en 
ticed  the  sages  into  the  discussion  and  abandoned  him 
to  arrange  the  bridge  tables  for  her  guests ;  who  had 
nestled  in  the  big  chair  as  girlish  as  the  two  girls 
with  her;  who  had,  with  a  hint  of  steel,  quelled  her 
husband's  obstreperousness  when  he  had  threatened 
to  sing  Mountain  Lad's  song;  who,  unafraid,  had 
bestridden  the  half-drowning  stallion  in  the  swim 
ming  tank;  and  who,  a  few  hours  later,  had  dreamed 
into  the  dining  room,  distinctive  in  dress  and  person, 
to  meet  her  many  guests. 

The  Big  House,  with  all  its  worthy  marvels  and 
bizarre  novelties,  competed  with  the  figure  of  Paula 
Forrest  in  filling  the  content  of  his  imagination. 
Once  again,  and  yet  again,  many  times,  he  saw  the 
slender  fingers  of  Dar  Hyal  weaving  argument  in 
the  air,  the  black  whiskers  of  Aaron  Hancock  enun 
ciating  Bergsonian  dogmas,  the  frayed  coat-cuffs  of 
Terrence  McFane  articulating  thanks  to  God  for  the 
two-legged  work-beasties  that  enabled  him  to  loaf 
at  Dick  Forrest's  board  and  under  Dick  Forrest's 
madrono  trees. 

Graham  knocked  out  his  pipe,  took  a  final  sweep 
ing  survey  of  the  strange  room  which  was  the  last 
word  in  comfort,  pressed  off  the  lights,  and  found 
himself  between  cool  sheets  in  the  wakeful  dark. 
Again  he  heard  Paula  Forrest  laugh ;  again  he  sensed 
her  in  terms  of  silver  and  steel  and  strength;  again, 
against  the  dark,  he  saw  that  inimitable  knee-lift  of 
her  gown.  The  bright  vision  of  it  was  almost  an  irk 
to  him,  so  impossible  was  it  for  him  to  shaTce  it  from 
his  eyes.  Ever  it  returned  and  burned  before  him, 
a  moving  image  of  light  and  color  that  he  knew  to  be 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  133 

subjective  but  that  continually  asserted  the  illusion  of 
reality. 

He  saw  stallion  and  rider  sink  beneath  the  water, 
and  rise  again,  a  flurry  of  foam  and  floundering  of 
hoofs,  and  a  woman's  face  that  laughed  while  she 
drowned  her  hair  in  the  drowning  mane  of  the  beast. 
And  the  first  ringing  bars  of  the  Prelude  sounded  in 
his  ears  as  again  he  saw  the  same  hands  that  had 
guided  the  stallion  lift  the  piano  to  all  Rachmani 
noff's  pure  splendor  of  sound. 

And  when  Graham  finally  fell  asleep,  it  was  in  the 
thick  of  marveling  over  the  processes  of  evolution 
that  could  produce  from  primeval  mire  and  dust  the 
glowing,  glorious  flesh  and  spirit  of  woman. 


CHAPTER  XII 

THE  next  morning  Graham  learned  further 
the  ways  of  the  Big  House.  Oh  My  had 
partly  initiated  him  in  particular  things  the 
preceding  day  and  had  learned  that,  after  the  wak 
ing  cup  of  coffee,  he  preferred  to  breakfast  at  table, 
rather  than  in  bed.  Also,  Oh  My  had  warned  him 
that  breakfast  at  table  was  an  irregular  affair,  any 
where  between  seven  and  nine,  and  that  the  break- 
fasters  merely  drifted  in  at  their  convenience.  If  he 
wanted  a  horse,  or  if  he  wanted  a  swim  or  a  motor 
car,  or  any  ranch  medium  or  utility  he  desired,  Oh 
My  informed  him,  all  he  had  to  do  was  to  call  for 
it. 

Arriving  in  the  breakfast  room  at  half  past  seven, 
Graham  found  himself  just  in  time  to  say  good-by 
to  the  Gazette  man  and  the  Idaho  buyer,  who,  fin 
ishing,  were  just  ready  to  catch  the  ranch  machine 
that  connected  at  Eldorado  with  the  morning  train 
for  San  Francisco.  He  sat  alone,  being  perfectly  in 
vited  by  a  perfect  Chinese  servant  to  order  as  he 
pleased,  and  found  himself  served  with  his  first  de 
sire  —  an  ice-cold,  sherried  grapefruit,  which,  the 
table-boy  proudly  informed  him,  was  "  grown  on  the 
ranch."  Declining  variously  suggested  breakfast 
foods,  mushes,  and  porridges,  Graham  had  just  or 
dered  his  soft-boiled  eggs  and  bacon,  when  Bert 
Wainwright  drifted  in  with  a  casualness  that  Graham 
recognized  as  histrionic,  when,  five  minutes  later,  in 

134 


THE  LITTLE  LADY  135 

boudoir  cap  and  delectable  negligee,  Ernestine  Des- 
ten  drifted  in  and  expressed  surprise  at  finding  such 
a  multitude  of  early  risers. 

Later,  as  the  three  of  them  were  rising  from  table, 
they  greeted  Lute  Desten  and  Rita  Wainwright  ar 
riving.  Over  the  billiard  table  with  Bert,  Graham 
learned  that  Dick  Forrest  never  appeared  for  break 
fast,  that  he  worked  in  bed  from  terribly  wee  small 
hours,  had  coffee  at  six,  and  only  on  unusual  occasions 
appeared  to  his  guests  before  the  twelve-thirty 
lunch.  As  for  Paula  Forrest,  Bert  explained,  she 
was  a  poor  sleeper,  a  late  riser,  lived  behind  a  door 
without  a  knob  in  a  spacious  wing  with  a  rare  and 
secret  patio  that  even  he  had  seen  but  once,  and  only 
on  infrequent  occasion  was  she  known  to  appear  be 
fore  twelve-thirty,  and  often  not  then. 

"  You  see,  she's  healthy  and  strong  and  all  that," 
he  explained,  "  but  she  was  born  with  insomnia.  She 
never  could  sleep.  She  couldn't  sleep  as  a  little  baby 
even.  But  it's  never  hurt  her  any,  because  she's  got 
a  will,  and  won't  let  it  get  on  her  nerves.  She's  just 
about  as  tense  as  they  make  them,  yet,  instead  of 
going  wild  when  she  can't  sleep,  she  just  wills  to  re 
lax,  and  she  does  relax.  She  calls  them  her  '  white 
nights,'  when  she  gets  them.  Maybe  she'll  fall 
asleep  at  daybreak,  or  at  nine^pr  ten  in  the  morning; 
and  then  she'll  sleep  the  rest  of  the  clock  around  and 
get  down  to  dinner  as  chipper  as  you  please."  . 

"  It's  constitutional,  I  fancy,"  Graham  suggested.  * 

Bert  nodded. 

"  It  would  be  a  handicap  to  nine  hundred  and 
ninety-nine  women  out  of  a  thousand.  But  not  to 
her.  She  puts  up  with  it,  and  if  she  can't  sleep  one 


136  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

time  —  she  should  worry  —  she  just  sleeps  some 
other  time  and  makes  it  up." 

More  and  other  things  Bert  Wainwright  told  of 
his  hostess,  and  Graham  was  not  slow  in  gathering 
that  the  young  man,  despite  the  privileges  of  long 
acquaintance,  stood  a  good  deal  in  awe  of  her. 

" 1  never  saw  anybody  whose  goat  she  couldn't 
get  if  she  went  after  it,"  he  confided.  "  Man  or 
woman  or  servant,  age,  sex,  and  previous  condition 
of  servitude  —  it's  all  one  when  she  gets  on  the  high 
and  mighty.  And  I  don't  see  how  she  does  it. 
Maybe  it's  just  a  kind  of  light  that  comes  into  her 
eyes,  or  some  kind  of  an  expression  on  her  lips,  or, 
I  don't  know  what  —  anyway,  she  puts  it  across  and 
nobody  makes  any,  mistake  about  it." 

"  She  has  a  ...  a  way  with  her,"  Graham  vol 
unteered. 

"  That's  it !  "  Bert's  face  beamed.  "  It's  a  way 
she  has.  She  just  puts  it  over.  Kind  of  gives  you 
a  chilly  feeling,  you  don't  know  why.  Maybe  she's 
learned  to  be  so  quiet  about  it  because  of  the  control 
she's  learned  by  passing  sleepless  nights  without 
squealing  out  or  getting  sour.  The  chances  are  she 
didn't  bat  an  eye  all  last  night  —  excitement,  you 
know,  the  crowd,  swimming  Mountain  Lad  and  such 
things.  Now  ordinary  things  that'd  keep  most 
women  awake,  like  danger,  or  storm  at  sea,  and  such 
things,  Dick  says  don't  faze  her.  She  can  sleep  like 
a  baby,  he  says,  when  the  town  she's  in  is  being  bom 
barded  or  when  the  ship  she's  in  is  trying  to  claw 
off  a  lee  shore.  She's  a  wonder,  and  no  mistake. 
You  ought  to  play  billiards  with  her  —  the  English 
game.  She'll  go  some." 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  137 

A  little  later,  Graham,  along  with  Bert,  encoun 
tered  the  girls  in  the  morning  room,  where,  despite 
an  hour  of  rag-time  song  and  dancing  and  chatter, 
he  was  scarcely  for  a  moment  unaware  of  a  loneli 
ness,  a  lack,  and  a  desire  to  see  his  hostess,  in  some 
fresh  and  unguessed  mood  and  way,  come  in  upon 
them  through  the  open  door. 

Still  later,  mounted  on  Altadena  and  accompanied 
by  Bert  on  a  thoroughbred  mare  called  Mollie, 
Graham  made  a  two  hours'  exploration  of  the  dairy 
center  of  the  ranch,  and  arrived  back  barely  in  time 
to  keep  an  engagement  with  Ernestine  in  the  tennis 
court. 

He  came  to  lunch  with  an  eagerness  for  which  his 
keen  appetite  could  not  entirely  account;  and  he  knew 
definite  disappointment  when  his  hostess  did  not  ap 
pear. 

u  A  white  night,"  Dick  Forrest  surmised  for  his 
guest's  benefit,  and  went  into  details  additional  to 
Bert's  of  her  constitutional  inaptitude  for  normal 
sleep.  "  Do  you  know,  we  were  married  years  be 
fore  I  ever  saw  her  sleep.  I  knew  she  did  sleep, 
but  I  never  saw  her.  I've  seen  her  go  three  days 
and  nights  without  closing  an  eye  and  keep  sweet 
and  cheerful  all  the  time,  and  when  she  did  sleep, 
it  was  out  of  exhaustion.  That  was  when  the  All 
Away  went  ashore  in  the  Carolines  and  the  whole 
population  worked  to  get  us  off.  It  wasn't  the  dan 
ger,  for  there  wasn't  any.  It  was  the  noise.  Also, 
it  was  the  excitement.  She  was  too  busy  living. 
And  when  it  was  almost  all  over,  I  actually  saw  her 
asleep  for  the  first  time  in  my  life." 

A  new  guest  had  arrived  that  morning,  a  Donald 


138  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

Ware,  whom  Graham  met  at  lunch.  He  seemed 
well  acquainted  with  all,  as  if  he  had  visited  much  in 
the  Big  House;  and  Graham  gathered  that,  despite 
his  youth,  he  was  a  violinist  of  note  on  the  Pacific 
Coast. 

"  He  has  conceived  a  grand  passion  for  Paula," 
Ernestine  told  Graham  as  they  passed  out  from  the 
dining  room. 

Graham  raised  his  eyebrows. 

"  Oh,  but  she  doesn't  mind,"  Ernestine  laughed. 
"  Every  man  that  comes  along  does  the  same  thing. 
She's  used  to  it.  She  has  just  a  charming  way  of 
disregarding  all  their  symptoms,  and  enjoys  them, 
and  gets  the  best  out  of  them  in  consequence.  It's 
lots  of  fun  to  Dick.  You'll  be  doing  the  same  be 
fore  you're  here  a  week.  If  you  don't,  we'll  all  be 
surprised  mightily.  And  if  you  don't,  most  likely 
you'll  hurt  Dick's  feelings.  He's  come  to  expect  it 
as  a  matter  of  course.  And  when  a  fond,  proud 
huband  gets  a  habit  like  that,  it  must  hurt  terribly 
to  see  his  wife  not  appreciated." 

u  Oh,  well,  if  I  am  expected  to,  I  suppose  I  must," 
Graham  sighed.  "  But  just  the  same  I  hate  to  do 
whatever  everybody  does  just  because  everybody 
does  it.  But  if  it's  the  custom  —  well,  it's  the  cus 
tom,  that's  all.  But  it's  mighty  hard  on  one  with 
so  many  other  nice  girls  around." 

There  was  a  quizzical  light  in  his  long  gray  eyes 
that  affected  Ernestine  so  profoundly  that  she  gazed 
into  his  eyes  over  long,  became  conscious  of  what 
she  was  doing,  dropped  her  own  eyes  away,  and 
flushed. 

"  Little  Leo  —  the  boy  poet  you  remember  last 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  139 

night,"  she  rattled  on  in  a  patent  attempt  to  escape 
from  her  confusion.  "  He's  madly  in  love  with 
Paula,  too.  I've  heard  Aaron  Hancock  chaffing  him 
about  some  sonnet  cycle,  and  it  isn't  difficult  to  guess 
the  inspiration.  And  Terrence  —  the  Irishman,  you 
know  —  he's  mildly  in  love  with  her.  They  can't 
help  it,  you  see;  and  can  you  blame  them?  " 

"  She  surely  deserves  it  all,"  Graham  murmured, 
although  vaguely  hurt  in  that  the  addle-pated,  alpha 
bet-obsessed,  epicurean  anarchist  of  an  Irishman  who 
gloried  in  being  a  loafer  and  a  pensioner  should  even 
mildly  be  in  love  with  the  Little  Lady.  "  She  is 
most  deserving  of  all  men's  admiration,"  he  con 
tinued  smoothly.  "  From  the  little  I've  seen  of  her 
she's  quite  remarkable  and  most  charming." 

"  She's  my  half-sister,"  Ernestine  vouchsafed,  "  al 
though  you  wouldn't  dream  a  drop  of  the  same  blood 
ran  in  our  veins.  She's  so  different.  She's  different 
from  all  the  Destens,  from  any  girl  I  ever  knew  - 
though  she  isn't  exactly  a  girl.  She's  thirty-eight, 
you  know  — " 

"  Pussy,  pussy,"  Graham  whispered. 

The  pretty  young  blonde  looked  at  him  in  surprise 
and  bewilderment,  taken  aback  by  the  apparent  ir 
relevance  of  his  interruption. 

"  Cat,"  he  censured  in  mock  reproof. 

"  Oh!  "  she  cried.  "  I  never  meant  it  that  way. 
"  You  will  find  we  are  very  frank  here.  Everybody 
knows  Paula's  age.  She  tells  it  herself.  I'm 
eighteen  —  so,  there.  And  now,  just  for  your  mean 
ness,  how  old  are  you?" 

"  As  old  as  Dick,"  he  replied  promptly. 

"  And   he's    forty,"    she    laughed   triumphantly. 


140  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"Are  you  coming  swimming?  —  the  water  will  be 
dreadfully  cold." 

Graham  shook  his  head.  "  I'm  going  riding  with 
Dick." 

Her  face  fell  with  all  the  ingenuousness  of  eight 
een. 

"  Oh,"  she  protested,  "  some  of  his  eternal  green 
manures,  or  hillside  terracing,  or  water-pocketing." 

"  But  he  said  something  about  swimming  at 
five." 

Her  face  brightened  joyously. 
'  Then  we'll  meet  at  the  tank.     It  must  be  the 
same  party.     Paula  said  swimming  at  five." 

As  they  parted  under  a  long  arcade,  where  his 
way  led  to  the  tower  room  for  a  change  into  riding 
clothes,  she  stopped  suddenly  and  called: 

"  Oh,  Mr.  Graham." 

He  turned  obediently. 

'  You  really  are  not  compelled  to  fall  in  love 
with  Paula,  you  know.  It  was  just  my  way  of  put 
ting  it." 

"  I  shall  be  very,  very  careful,"  he  said  solemnly, 
although  there  was  a  twinkle  in  his  eye  as  he  con 
cluded. 

Nevertheless,  as  he  went  on  to  his  room,  he  could 
not  but  admit  to  himself  that  the  Paula  Forrest 
charm,  or  the  far  fairy  tentacles  of  it,  had  already 
reached  him  and  were  wrapping  around  him.  He 
knew,  right  there,  that  he  would  prefer  the  engage 
ment  to  ride  to  have  been  with  her  than  with  his 
old-time  friend,  Dick. 

As  he  emerged  from  the  house  to  the  long  hitch- 
ing-rails  under  the  ancient  oaks,  he  looked  eagerly 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  141 

for  his  hostess.  Only  Dick  was  there,  and  the 
stable-man,  although  the  many  saddled  horses  that 
stamped  in  the  shade  promised  possibilities.  But 
Dick  and  he  rode  away  alone.  Dick  pointed  out  her 
horse,  an  alert  bay  thoroughbred,  stallion  at  that, 
under  a  small  Australian  saddle  with  steel  stirrups, 
and  double-reined  and  single-bitted. 

"  I  don't  know  her  plans,"  he  said.  "  She  hasn't 
shown  up  yet,  but  at  any  rate  she'll  be  swimming 
later.  We'll  meet  her  then." 

Graham  appreciated  and  enjoyed  the  ride,  al 
though  more  than  once  he  found  himself  glancing 
at  his  wrist-watch  to  ascertain  how  far  away  five 
o'clock  might  yet  be.  Lambing  time  was  at  hand, 
and  through  home  field  after  home  field  he  rode  with 
his  host,  now  one  and  now  the  other  dismounting 
to  turn  over  onto  its  feet  rotund  and  glorious  Shrop 
shire  and  Ramboullet-Merino  ewes  so  hopelessly  the 
product  of  man's  selection  as  to  be  unable  to  get  off, 
of  themselves,  from  their  own  broad  backs,  once 
they  were  down  with  their  four  legs  helplessly  sky- 
aspiring. 

"  I've  really  worked  to  make  the  American 
Merino,"  Dick  was  saying;  "  to  give  it  the  developed 
leg,  the  strong  back,  the  well-sprung  rib,  and  the 
stamina.  The  old-country  breed  lacked  the  stamina. 
It  was  too  much  hand-reared  and  manicured." 

"  You're  doing  things,  big  things,"  Graham  as 
sured  him.  "  Think  of  shipping  rams  to  Idaho ! 
That  speaks  for  itself." 

Dick  Forrest's  eyes  were  sparkling,  as  he  replied: 

u  Better  than  Idaho.  Incredible  as  it  may  sound, 
and  asking  forgiveness  for  bragging,  the  great  flocks 


H2  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

to-day  of  Michigan  and  Ohio  can  trace  back  to  my 
California-bred  Ramboullet  rams.  Take  Australia. 
Twelve  years  ago  I  sold  three  rams  for  three  hun 
dred  each  to  a  visiting  squatter.  After  he  took  them 
back  and  demonstrated  them  he  sold  them  for  as 
many  thousand  each  and  ordered  a  shipload  more 
from  me.  Australia  will  never  be  the  worse  for  my 
having  been.  Down  there  they  say  that  lucerne,  ar 
tesian  wells,  refrigerator  ships,  and  Forrest's  rams 
have  tripled  the  wool  and  mutton  production." 

Quite  by  chance,  on  the  way  back,  meeting  Men- 
denhall,  the  horse  manager,  they  were  deflected  by 
him  to  a  wide  pasture,  broken  by  wooded  canyons 
and  studded  with  oaks,  to  look  over  a  herd  of  year 
ling  Shires  that  was  to  be  dispatched  next  morn 
ing  to  the  upland  pastures  and  feeding  sheds  of  the 
Miramar  Hills.  There  were  nearly  two  hundred 
of  them,  rough-coated,  beginning  to  shed,  large- 
boned  and  large  for  their  age. 

'  We  don't  exactly  crowd  them,"  Dick  Forrest  ex 
plained,  "  but  Mr.  Mendenhall  sees  to  it  that  they 
never  lack  full  nutrition  from  the  time  they  are 
foaled.  Up  there  in  the  hills,  where  they  are  going, 
they'll  balance  their  grass  with  grain.  This  makes 
them  assemble  every  night  at  the  feeding  places  and 
enables  the  feeders  to  keep  track  of  them  with  a 
minimum  of  effort.  I've  shipped  fifty  stallions,  two- 
year-olds,  every  year  for  the  past  five  years,  to 
Oregon  alone.  They're  sort  of  standardized,  you 
know.  The  people  up  there  know  what  they're  get 
ting.  They  know  my  standard  so  well  that  they'll 
buy  unsight  and  unseen." 

"  You  must  cull  a  lot,  then,"  Graham  ventured. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  143 

"  And  you'll  see  the  culls  draying  on  the  streets 
of  San  Francisco,"  Dick  answered. 

"  Yes,  and  on  the  streets  of  Denver,"  Mr.  Men- 
denhall  amplified,  "  and  of  Los  Angeles,  and  —  why, 
two  years  ago,  in  the  horse-famine,  we  shipped 
twenty  carloads  of  four-year  geldings  to  Chicago, 
that  averaged  seventeen  hundred  each.  The  light 
est  were  sixteen,  and  there  were  matched  pairs  up 
to  nineteen  hundred.  Lord,  Lord,  that  was  a  year 
for  horse-prices  —  blue  sky,  and  then  some." 

As  Mr.  Mendenhall  rode  away,  a  man,  on  a  slen 
der-legged,  head-tossing  Palomina,  rode  up  to  them 
and  was  introduced  to  Graham  as  Mr.  Hennessy,  the 
ranch  veterinary. 

"  I  heard  Mrs.  Forrest  was  looking  over  the 
colts,"  he  explained  to  his  employer,  "  and  I  rode 
across  to  give  her  a  glance  at  The  Fawn  here.  She'll 
be  riding  her  in  less  than  a  week.  What  horse  is 
she  on  to-day?  " 

"  The  Fop,"  Dick  replied,  as  if  expecting  the  com 
ment  that  was  prompt  as  the  disapproving  shake  of 
Mr.  Hennessy's  head. 

"  I  can  never  become  converted  to  women  riding 
stallions,"  muttered  the  veterinary.  "  The  Fop  is 
dangerous.  Worse  —  though  I  take  my  fiat  off  to 
his  record  —  he's  malicious  and  vicious.  She  — 
Mrs.  Forrest  ought  to  ride  him  with  a  muzzle  —  but 
he's  a  striker  as  well,  and  I  don't  see  how  she  can 
put  cushions  on  his  hoofs." 

"  Oh,  well,"  Dick  placated,  "  she  has  a  bit  that  is 
a  bit  in  his  mouth,  and  she's  not  afraid  to  use  it  — " 

"  If  he  doesn't  fall  over  on  her  some  day,"  Mr. 
Hennessy  grumbled.  "  Anyway,  I'll  breathe  easier 


144  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

when  she  takes  to  The  Fawn  here.  Now  she's  a 
lady's  mount  —  all  the  spirit  in  the  world,  but  noth 
ing  vicious.  She's  a  sweet  mare,  a  sweet  mare,  and 
she'll  steady  down  from  her  friskiness.  But  she'll 
always  be  a  gay  handful  —  no  riding  academy  propo 


sition." 


"  Let's  ride  over,"  Dick  suggested.  "  Mrs.  For- 
rest'll  have  a  gay  handful  in  The  Fop  if  she's  ridden 
him  into  that  bunch  of  younglings. —  It's  her  terri 
tory,  you  know,"  he  elucidated  to  Graham.  -  All 
the  house  horses  and  lighter  stock  is  her  affair.  And 
she  gets  grand  results.  I  can't  understand  it,  myself. 
It's  like  a  little  girl  straying  into  an  experimental  lab 
oratory  of  high  explosives  and  mixing  the  stuff 
around  any  old  way  and  getting  more  powerful  com 
binations  than  the  graybeard  chemists." 

The  three  men  took  a  cross-ranch  road  for  half  a 
mile,  turned  up  a  wooded  canyon  where  ran  a  spring- 
trickle  of  stream,  and  emerged  on  a  wide  rolling  ter 
race  rich  in  pasture.  Graham's  first  glimpse  was  of 
a  background  of  many  curious  yearling  and  two-year- 
old  colts,  against  which,  in  the  middleground,  he 
saw  his  hostess,  on  the  back  of  the  bright  bay  thor 
oughbred,  The  Fop,  who,  on  hind  legs,  was  striking 
his  forefeet  in  the  air  and  squealing  shrilly.  They 
reined  in  their  mounts  and  watched. 

"  He'll  get  her  yet,"  the  veterinary  muttered  mo 
rosely.  "  That  Fop  isn't  safe." 

But  at  that  moment  Paula  Forrest,  unaware  of  her 
audience,  with  a  sharp  cry  of  command  and  a  cavalier 
thrust  of  sharp  spurs  into  The  Fop's  silken  sides, 
checked  him  down  to  four-footedness  on  the  ground 
and  a  restless,  champing  quietness. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  145 

"  Taking  chances?  "  Dick  mildly  reproached  her, 
as  the  three  rode  up. 

"  Oh,  I  can  manage  him,"  she  breathed  between 
tight  teeth,  as,  with  ears  back  and  vicious-gleaming 
eyes,  The  Fop  bared  his  teeth  in  a  bite  that  would 
have  been  perilously  near  to  Graham's  leg  had  she 
not  reined  the  brute  abruptly  away  across  the  neck 
and  driven  both  spurs  solidly  into  his  sides. 

The  Fop  quivered,  squealed,  and  for  the  moment 
stood  still. 

"  It's  the  old  game,  the  white  man's  game,"  Dick 
laughed.  "  She's  not  afraid  of  him,  and  he  knows 
it.  She  outgames  him,  out-savages  him,  teaches  him 
what  savagery  is  in  its  intimate  mood  and  tense." 

Three  times,  while  they  looked  on,  ready  to  whirl 
their  own  steeds  away  if  he  got  out  of  hand,  The 
Fop  attempted  to  burst  into  rampage,  and  three 
times,  solidly,  with  careful,  delicate  hand  on  the  bit 
ter  bit,  Paula  Forrest  dealt  him  double  spurs  in  the 
ribs,  till  he  stood,  sweating,  frothing,  fretting,  beaten, 
and  in  hand. 

"  It's  the  way  the  white  man  has  always  done," 
Dick  moralized,  while  Graham  suffered  a  fluttery, 
shivery  sensation  of  admiration  of  the  beast-conquer 
ing  Little  Lady.  "  He's  out-savaged  the  savage  the 
world  around,"  Dick  went  on.  "  He's  out-endured 
him,  out-filthed  him,  out-scalped  him,  out-tortured 
him,  out-eaten  him  —  yes,  out-eaten  him.  It's  a  fair 
wager  that  the  white  man,  in  extremis,  has  eaten 
more  of  the  genus  homo,  than  the  savage,  in  extre 
mis,  has  eaten." 

"  Good  afternoon,"  Paula  greeted  her  guest,  the 
ranch  veterinary,  and  her  husband.  "  I  think  I've 


146  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

got  him  now.  Let's  look  over  the  colts.  Just  keep 
an  eye,  Mr.  Graham,  on  his  mouth.  He's  a  dread 
ful  snapper.  Ride  free  from  him,  and  you'll  save 
your  leg  for  old  age." 

Now  that  The  Fop's  demonstration  was  over,  the 
colts,  startled  into  flight  by  some  impish  spirit 
amongst  them,  galloped  and  frisked  away  over  the 
green  turf,  until,  curious  again,  they  circled  back, 
halted  at  gaze,  and  then,  led  by  one  particularly 
saucy  chestnut  filly,  drew  up  in  half  a  circle  before  the 
riders,  with  alert  pricking  ears. 

Graham  scarcely  saw  the  colts  at  first.  He  was 
seeing  his  protean  hostess  in  a  new  role.  Would  her 
proteanness  never  end?  he  wondered,  as  he  glanced 
over  the  magnificent,  sweating,  mastered  creature  she 
bestrode.  Mountain  Lad,  despite  his  hugeness,  was 
a  mild-mannered  pet  beside  this  squealing,  biting, 
striking  Fop  who  advertised  all  the  spirited  vicious- 
ness  of  the  most  spirited  vicious  thoroughbred. 

"  Look  at  her,"  Paula  whispered  to  Dick,  in  order 
not  to  alarm  the  saucy  chestnut  filly.  "  Isn't  she 
wonderful!  That's  what  I've  been  working  for." 
Paula  turned  to  Evan.  "  Always  they  have  some 
fault,  some  miss,  at  the  best  an  approximation  rather 
than  an  achievement.  But  she's  an  achievement. 
Look  at  her.  She's  as  near  right  as  I  shall  probably 
ever  get.  Her  sire  is  Big  Chief,  if  you  know  our 
racing  register.  He  sold  for  sixty  thousand  when 
he  was  a  cripple.  We  borrowed  the  use  of  him. 
She  was  his  only  get  of  the  season.  But  look  at  her ! 
She's  got  his  chest  and  lungs.  I  had  my  choices  — 
mares  eligible  for  the  register.  Her  dam  wasn't 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  147 

eligible,  but  I  chose  her.  She  was  an  obstinate  old 
maid,  but  she  was  the  one  mare  for  Big  Chief.  This 
is  her  first  foal  and  she  was  eighteen  years  old  when 
she  bred.  But  I  knew  it  was  there.  All  I  had  to 
do  was  to  look  at  Big  Chief  and  her,  and  it  just  had 
to  be  there.1' 

"  The  dam  was  only  half  thoroughbred,"  Dick 
explained. 

"  But  with  a  lot  of  Morgan  on  the  other  side," 
Paula  added  instantly,  "  and  a  streak  along  the  back 
of  mustang.  This  shall  be  called  Nymph,  even  if 
she  has  no  place  in  the  books.  She'll  be  my  first  un 
impeachable  perfect  saddle  horse  —  I  know  it  —  the 
kind  I  like  —  my  dream  come  true  at  last." 

"  A  hoss  has  four  legs,  one  on  each  corner,"  Mr. 
Hennessy  uttered  profoundly. 

"  And  from  five  to  seven  gaits,"  Graham  took  up 
lightly. 

"  And  yet  I  don't  care  for  those  many-gaited  Ken- 
tuckians,"  Paula  said  quickly,  " —  except  for  park 
work.  But  for  California,  rough  roads,  mountain 
trails,  and  all  the  rest,  give  me  the  fast  walk,  the  fox 
trot,  the  long  trot  that  covers  the  ground,  and  the 
not  too-long,  ground-covering  gallop.  Of  course, 
the  close-coupled,  easy  canter ;  but  I  scarcely  call  that 
a  gait  —  it's  no  more  than  the  long  lope  reduced  to 
the  adjustment  of  wind  or  rough  ground." 

"  She's  a  beauty,"  Dick  admired,  his  eyes  warm 
in  contemplation  of  the  saucy  chestnut  filly,  who  was 
daringly  close  and  alertly  sniffing  of  the  subdued 
Fop's  tremulous  and  nostril-dilated  muzzle. 

"  I  prefer  my  own  horses  to  be  near  thoroughbred 


148  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

rather  than  all  thoroughbred,"  Paula  proclaimed. 
"  The  running  horse  has  its  place  on  the  track,  but 
it's  too  specialized  for  mere  human  use." 

"  Nicely  coupled,"  Mr.  Hennessy  said,  indicating 
the  Nymph.  "  Short  enough  for  good  running  and 
long  enough  for  the  long  trot.  I'll  admit  I  didn't 
have  any  faith  in  the  combination;  but  youVe  got  a 
grand  animal  out  of  it  just  the  same." 

"  I  didn't  have  horses  when  I  was  a  young  girl," 
Paula  said  to  Graham;  "  and  the  fact  that  I  can  how 
not  only  have  them  but  breed  them  and  mold  them 
to  my  heart's  desire  is  always  too  good  to  be  true. 
Sometimes  I  can't  believe  it  myself,  and  have  to  ride 
out  and  look  them  over  to  make  sure." 

She  turned  her  head  and  raised  her  eyes  grate 
fully  to  Forrest;  and  Graham  watched  them  look 
into  each  other's  eyes  for  a  long  half-minute.  For 
rest's  pleasure  in  his  wife's  pleasure,  in  her  young 
enthusiasm  and  joy  of  life,  was  clear  to  Gra 
ham's  observation.  "  Lucky  devil,"  was  Graham's 
thought,  not  because  of  his  host's  vast  ranch  and  the 
success  and  achievement  of  it,  but  because  of  the 
possession  of  a  wonder-woman  who  could  look  un 
abashed  and  appreciative  into  his  eyes  as  the  Little 
Lady  had  looked. 

Graham  was  meditating,  with  skepticism,  Ernes 
tine's  information  that  Paula  Forrest  was  thirty- 
eight,  when  she  turned  to  the  colts  and  pointed  her 
riding  whip  at  a  black  yearling  nibbling  at  the  spring 
green. 

"  Look  at  that  level  rump,  Dick,"  she  said,  "  and 
those  trotting  feet  and  pasterns."  And,  to  Graham : 
"  Rather  different  from  Nymph's  long  wrists,  aren't 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  149 

they?  But  they're  just  what  I  was  after."  She 
laughed  a  little,  with  just  a  shade  of  annoyance. 
"  The  dam  was  a  bright  sorrel  —  almost  like  a  fresh- 
minted  twenty-dollar  piece  —  and  I  did  so  want  a 
pair  out  of  her,  of  the  same  color,  for  my  own  trap. 
Well,  I  can't  say  that  I  exactly  got  them,  although 
I  bred  her  to  a  splendid,  sorrel  trotting  horse.  And 
this  is  my  reward,  this  black  —  and,  wait  till  we  get 
to  the  brood  mares  and  you'll  see  the  other,  a  full 
brother  and  mahogany  brown.  I'm  so  disap 
pointed." 

She  singled  out  a  pair  of  dark  bays,  feeding  to 
gether  :  "  Those  are  two  of  Guy  Dillon's  get  — 
brother,  you  know,  to  Lou  Dillon.  They're  out  of 
different  mares,  not  quite  the  same  bay,  but  aren't 
they  splendidly  matched  ?  And  they  both  have  Guy 
Dillon's  coat." 

She  moved  her  subdued  steed  on,  skirting  the  flank 
of  the  herd  quietly  in  order  not  to  alarm  it;  but  a 
number  of  colts  took  flight. 

"  Look  at  them !  "  she  cried.  "  Five,  there,  are 
hackneys.  Look  at  the  lift  of  their  fore-legs  as 
they  run." 

"  I'll  be  terribly  disappointed  if  you  don't  get  a 
prize-winning  four-in-hand  out  of  them,"  Dick 
praised,  and  brought  again  the  flash  of  grateful  eyes 
that  hurt  Graham  as  he  noted  it. 

"  Two  are  out  of  heavier  mares  • —  see  that  one  in 
the  middle  and  the  one  on  the  far  left  —  and  there's 
the  other  three  to  pick  from  for  the  leaders.  Same 
sire,  five  different  dams,  and  a  matched  and  balanced 
four,  out  of  five  choices,  all  in  the  same  season,  is  a 
stroke  of  luck,  isn't  it?  " 


i5o  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

She  turned  quickly  to  Mr.  Hennessy :  "  I  can  be 
gin  to  see  the  ones  that  will  have  to  sell  for  polo 
ponies  —  among  the  two-year-olds.  You  can  pick 
them." 

"  If  Mr.  Mendenhall  doesn't  sell  that  strawberry 
roan  for  a  clean  fifteen  hundred,  it'll  be  because  polo 
has  gone  out  of  fashion,"  the  veterinary  approved, 
with  waxing  enthusiasm.  "  I've  had  my  eye  on 
them.  That  pale  sorrel,  there.  You  remember  his 
set-back.  Give  him  an  extra  year  and  he'll  —  look 
at  his  coupling !  —  watch  him  turn !  —  a  cow-skin  ? 
—  he'll  turn  on  a  silver  dollar !  Give  him  a  year  to 
make  up,  and  he'll  stand  a  show  for  the  international. 
Listen  to  me.  I've  had  my  faith  in  him  from  the 
beginning.  Cut  out  that  Burlingame  crowd.  When 
he's  ripe,  ship  him  straight  East." 

Paula  nodded  and  listened  to  Mr.  Hennessy's 
judgment,  her  eyes  kindling  with  his  in  the  warmth 
of  the  sight  of  the  abounding  young  life  for  which 
she  was  responsible. 

"  It  always  hurts,  though,"  she  confessed  to  Gra 
ham,  u  selling  such  beauties  to  have  them  knocked 
out  on  the  field  so  quickly." 

Her  sheer  absorption  in  the  animals  robbed  her 
speech  of  any  hint  of  affectation  or  show  —  so  much 
so,  that  Dick  was  impelled  to  praise  her  judgment 
to  Evan. 

"  I  can  dig  through  a  whole  library  of  horse  prac 
tice,  and  muddle  and  mull  over  the  Mendelian  Law 
ijrftil  I'm  dizzy,  like  the  clod  that  I  am;  but  she  is 
/the  genius.  She  doesn't  have  to  study  law.  She  just 
/  knows  it  in  some  witch-like,  intuitional  way.  All 
|  she  has  to  do  is  size  up  a  bunch  of  mares  with  her 

\* — 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  151 

eyes,  and  feel  them  over  a  little  with  her  hands,  and 
hunt  around  till  she  finds  the  right  sires,  and  get 
pretty  nearly  what  she  wants  in  the  result  —  except 
color,  eh,  Paul?  "  he  teased. 

She  showed  her  laughing  teeth  in  the  laugh  at  her 
expense,  in  which  Mr.  Hennessy  joined,  and  Dick 
continued :  "  Look  at  that  filly  there.  We  all  knew 
Paula  was  wrong.  But  look  at  it!  She  bred  a 
rickety  old  thoroughbred,  that  we  wanted  to  put  out 
of  her  old  age,  to  a  standard  stallion;  got  a  filly; 
bred  it  back  with  a  thoroughbred ;  bred  its  filly  foal 
with  the  same  standard  again;  knocked  all  our  prog 
nostications  into  a  cocked  hat,  and  —  well,  look  at  it, 
a  world-beater  polo  pony.  There  is  one  thing  we 
have  to  take  off  our  hats  to  her  for:  she  doesn't  let 
any  woman  sentimentality  interfere  with  her  culling. 
Oh,  she's  cold-blooded  enough.  She's  as  remorse 
less  as  any  man  when  it  comes  to  throwing  out  the 
undesirables  and  selecting  for  what  she  wants.  But 
she  hasn't  mastered  color  yet.  There's  where  her 
genius  falls  down,  eh,  Paul?  You'll  have  to  put  up 
with  Duddy  and  Fuddy  for  a  while  longer  for  your 
trap.  By  the  way,  how  is  Duddy?  " 

"  He's  come  around,"  she  answered,  "  thanks  to 
Mr.  Hennessy." 

"  Nothing  serious,"  the  veterinarian  added.  "  He 
was  just  off  his  feed  a  trifle.  It  was  more  a  scare  of 
the  stableman  than  anything  else." 


CHAPTER  XIII 

FROM  the  colt  pasture  to  the  swimming  tank 
Graham  talked  with  his  hostess  and  rode  as 
nearly  beside  her  as  The  Fop's  wickedness  per 
mitted,  while  Dick  and  Hennessy,  on  ahead,  were 
deep  in  ranch  business. 

"  Insomnia  has  been  a  handicap  all  my  life,"  she 
said,  while  she  tickled  The  Fop  with  a  spur  in  order 
to  check  a  threatened  belligerence.  "  But  I  early 
learned  to  keep  the  irritation  of  it  off  rny  nerves  and 
the  weight  of  it  off  my  mind.  In  fact,  I  early  came 
to  make  a  function  of  it  and  actually  to  derive  en 
joyment  from  it.  It  was  the  only  way  to  master  a 
thing  I  knew  would  persist  as  long  as  I  persisted. 
Have  you  —  of  course  you  have  —  learned  to  win 
through  an  undertow?  " 

"  Yes,  by  never  fighting  it,"  Graham  answered,  his 
eyes  on  the  spray  of  color  in  her  cheeks  and  the  tiny 
beads  of  sweat  that  arose  from  her  continuous 
struggle  with  the  high-strung  creature  she  rode. 
Thirty-eight!  He  wondered  if  Ernestine  had  lied. 
Paula  Forrest  did  not  look  twenty-eight.  Her  skin 
was  the  skin  of  a  girl,  with  all  the  delicate,  fine-pored 
and  thin  transparency  of  the  skin  of  a  girl. 

"•  Exactly,"  she  went  on.  "  By  not  fighting  the 
undertow.  By  yielding  to  its  down-drag  and  out- 
drag,  and  working  with  it  to  reach  air  again.  Dick 
taught  me  that  trick.  So  with  my  insomnia.  If  it 

152 


THE  LITTLE  LADY  153 

is  excitement  from  immediate  events  that  holds  me 
back  from  the  City  of  Sleep,  I  yield  to  it  and  come 
quicker  to  unconsciousness  from  out  the  entangling 
currents.  I  invite  my  soul  to  live  over  again,  from 
the  same  and  different  angles,  the  things  that  keep 
me  from  unconsciousness. 

"  Take  the  swimming  of  Mountain  Lad  yesterday. 
I  lived  it  over  last  night  as  I  had  lived  it  in  reality. 
Then  I  lived  it  as  a  spectator  —  as  the  girls  saw  it, 
as  you  saw  it,  as  the  cowboy  saw  it,  and,  most  of  all, 
as  my  husband  saw  it.  Then  I  made  up  a  picture  of 
it,  many  pictures  of  it,  from  all  angles,  and  painted 
them,  and  framed  them,  and  hung  them,  and  then,  a 
spectator,  looked  at  them  as  if  for  the  first  time. 
And  I  made  myself  many  kinds  of  spectators,  from 
crabbed  old  maids  and  lean  pantaloons  to  girls  in 
boarding  school  and  Greek  boys  of  thousands  of 
years  ago. 

"  After  that  I  put  it  to  music.  I  played  it  on  the 
piano,  and  guessed  the  playing  of  it  on  full  orchestras 
and  blaring  bands.  I  chanted  it,  I  sang  it  —  epic, 
lyric,  comic;  and,  after  a  weary  long  while,  of  course 
I  slept  in  the  midst  of  it,  and  knew  not  that  I  slept 
until  I  awoke  at  twelve  to-day.  The  last  time  I  had 
heard  the  clock  strike  was  six.  Six  unbroken  hours 
is  a  capital  prize  for  me  in  the  sleep  lottery." 

As  she  finished,  Mr.  Hennessy  rode  away  on  a 
cross  path,  and  Dick  Forrest  dropped  back  to  squire 
his  wife  on  the  other  side. 

"  Will  you  sport  a  bet,  Evan?  "  he  queried. 

"  I'd  like  to  hear  the  terms  of  it  first,"  was  the 
answer. 

"  Cigars  against  cigars  that  you  can't  catch  Paula 


i54  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

in  the  tank  inside  ten  minutes  —  no,  inside  five,  for 
I  remember  you're  some  swimmer." 

"  Oh,  give  him  a  chance,  Dick,"  Paula  cried  gen 
erously.  "  Ten  minutes  will  worry  him." 

"  But  you  don't  know  him,"  Dicked  argued. 
"  And  you  don't  value  my  cigars.  I  tell  you  he  is  a 
swimmer.  He's  drowned  kanakas,  and  you  know 
what  that  means." 

"  Perhaps  I  should  reconsider.  Maybe  he'll  slash 
a  killing  crawl-stroke  at  me  before  I've  really  started. 
Tell  me  his  history  and  prizes." 

"  I'll  just  tell  you  one  thing.  They  still  talk  of  it 
in  the  Marquesas.  It  was  the  big  hurricane  of  1 892. 
He  did  forty  miles  in  forty-five  hours,  and  only  he 
and  one  other  landed  on  the  land.  And  they  were 
all  kanakas.  He  was  the  only  white  man;  yet  he 
out-endured  and  drowned  the  last  kanaka  of 
them  — " 

"  I  thought  you  said  there  was  one  other?  "  Paula 
interrupted. 

"  She  was  a  woman,"  Dick  answered.  "  He 
drowned  the  last  kanaka." 

"And  the  woman  was  then  a  white  woman?" 
Paula  insisted. 

Graham  looked  quickly  at  her,  and  although  she 
had  asked  the  question  of  her  husband,  her  head 
turned  to  the  turn  of  his  head,  so  that  he  found  her 
eyes  meeting  his  straightly  and  squarely  in  interroga 
tion.  Graham  held  her  gaze  with  equal  straightness 
as  he  answered:  "  She  was  a  kanaka." 

"  A  queen,  if  you  please,"  Dick  took  up.  "  A 
queen  out  of  the  ancient  chief  stock.  She  was  Queen 
of  Huahoa." 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  155 

"  Was  it  the  chief  stock  that  enabled  her  to  out- 
endure  the  native  men?"  Paula  asked.  "  Or  did 
you  help  her?  " 

"  I  rather  think  we  helped  each  other  toward  the 
end,"  Graham  replied.  '  We  were  both  out  of  our 
heads  for  short  spells  and  long  spells.  Sometimes 
it  was  one,  sometimes  the  other,  that  was  all  in.  We 
made  the  land  at  sunset  —  that  is,  a  wall  of  iron 
coast,  with  the  surf  bursting  sky-high.  She  took  hold 
of  me  and  clawed  me  in  the  water  to  get  some  sense 
in  me.  You  see,  I  wanted  to  go  in,  which  would 
have  meant  finish. 

"  She  got  me  to  understand  that  she  knew  where 
she  was;  that  the  current  set  westerly  along  shore 
and  in  two  hours  would  drift  us  abreast  of  a  spot 
where  we  could  land.  I  swear  I  either  slept  or  was 
unconscious  most  of  those  two  hours;  and  I  swear 
she  was  in  one  state  or  the  other  when  I  chanced  to 
come  to  and  noted  the  absence  of  the  roar  of  the 
surf.  Then  it  was  my  turn  to  claw  and  maul  her 
back  to  consciousness.  It  was  three  hours  more  be 
fore  we  made  the  sand.  We  slept  where  we  crawled 
out  of  the  water.  Next  morning's  sun  burnt  us 
awake,  and  we  crept  into  the  shade  of  some  wild 
bananas,  found  fresh  water,  and  went  to  sleep  again. 
Next  I  awoke  it  was  night.  I  took  another  drink, 
and  slept  through  till  morning.  She  was  still  asleep 
when  the  bunch  of  kanakas,  hunting  wild  goats  from 
the  next  valley,  found  us." 

"  I'll  wager,  for  a  man  who  drowned  a  whole 
kanaka  crew,  it  was  you  who  did  the  helping,"  Dick 
commented. 

"  She  must  have  been  forever  grateful,"  Paula 


156  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

challenged,  her  eyes  directly  on  Graham's.  "  Don't 
tell  me  she  wasn't  young,  wasn't  beautiful,  wasn't  a 
golden  brown  young  goddess." 

"  Her  mother  was  the  Queen  of  Huahoa,"  Gra 
ham  answered.  "  Her  father  was  a  Greek  scholar 
and  an  English  gentleman.  They  were  dead  at  the 
time  of  the  swim,  and  Nomare  was  queen  herself. 
She  was  young.  She  was  beautiful  as  any  woman 
anywhere  in  the  world  may  be  beautiful.  Thanks 
to  her  father's  skin,  she  as  not  golden  brown.  She 
was  tawny  golden.  But  you've  heard  the  story  un 
doubtedly  — " 

He  broke  off  with  a  look  of  question  to  Dick,  who 
shook  his  head. 

Calls  and  cries  and  splashings  of  water  from  be 
yond  a  screen  of  trees  warned  them  that  they  were 
near  the  tank. 

1  You'll  have  to  tell  me  the  rest  of  the  story  some 
time,"  Paula  said. 

"  Dick  knows  it.  I  can't  see  why  he  hasn't  told 
you." 

She  shrugged  her  shoulders. 

"  Perhaps  because  he's  never  had  the  time  or  the 
provocation." 

"  God  wot,  it's  had  wide  circulation,"  Graham 
laughed.  "  For  know  that  I  was  once  morganatic 
—  or  whatever  you  call  it  —  king  of  the  cannibal 
isles,  or  of  a  paradise  of  a  Polynesian  isle  at  any  rate. 
— *  By  a  purple  wave  on  an  opal  beach  in  the  hush  of 
the  Mahim  woods,'  "  he  hummed  carelessly,  in  con 
clusion,  and  swung  off  from  his  horse. 

"  *  The  white  moth  to  the  closing  vine,  the  bee  to 
the  opening  clover,'  "  she  hummed  another  line  of 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  157 

the  song,  while  The  Fop  nearly  got  his  teeth  into  her 
leg  and  she  straightened  him  out  with  the  spur,  and 
waited  for  Dick  to  help  her  off  and  tie  him. 

"Cigars!  —  I'm  in  on  that!  —  you  can't  catch 
her!  "  Bert  Wainwright  called  from  the  top  of  the 
high  dive  forty  feet  above.  "  Wait  a  minute !  I'm 
coming!  " 

And  come  he  did,  in  a  swan  dive  that  was  almost 
professional  and  that  brought  handclapping  approval 
from  the  girls. 

"  A  sweet  dive,  balanced  beautifully,"  Graham 
told  him  as  he  emerged  from  the  tank. 

Bert  tried  to  appear  unconscious  of  the  praise, 
failed,  and,  to  pass  it  off,  plunged  into  the  wager. 

"  I  don't  know  what  kind  of  a  swimmer  you  are, 
Graham,"  he  said,  "  but  I  just  want  in  with  Dick  on 
the  cigars." 

"Me,  too;  me,  too!"  chorused  Ernestine,  and 
Lute,  and  Rita. 

"  Boxes  of  candy,  gloves,  or  any  truck  you  care  to 
risk,"  Ernestine  added. 

"  But  I  don't  know  Mrs.  Forrest's  records,  either," 
Graham  protested,  after  having  taken  on  the  bets. 
"  However,  if  in  five  minutes  — " 

"  Ten  minutes,"  Paula  said,  "  and  to  start  from 
opposite  ends  of  the  tank.  Is  that  fair?  Any  touch 
is  a  catch." 

Graham  looked  his  hostess  over  with  secret  ap 
proval.  She  was  clad,  not  in  the  single  white  silk 
slip  she  evidently  wore  only  for  girl  parties,  but  in  a 
coquettish  imitation  of  the  prevailing  fashion  mode, 
a  suit  of  changeable  light  blue  and  green  silk  —  al- 


1 58  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

most  the  color  of  the  pool;  the  skirt  slightly  above 
the  knees  whose  roundedness  he  recognized;  with 
long  stockings  to  match,  and  tiny  bathing  shoes 
bound  on  with  crossed  ribbons.  On  her  head  was  a 
jaunty  swimming  cap  no  jauntier  than  herself  when 
she  urged  the  ten  minutes  in  place  of  five. 

Rita  Wainwright  held  the  watch,  while  Graham 
walked  down  to  the  other  end  of  the  hundred-and- 
fifty-foot  tank. 

"  Paula,  you'll  be  caught  if  you  take  any  chances," 
Dick  warned.  "  Evan  Graham  is  a  real  fish  man." 

"  I  guess  Paula'll  show  him  a  few,  even  without 
the  pipe,"  Bert  bragged  loyally.  "  And  I'll  bet  she 
can  out-dive  him." 

u  There  you  lose,"  Dick  answered.  "  I  saw  the 
rock  he  c  cd  from  at  Huahoa.  That  was  after  his 
time,  and  after  the  death  of  Queen  Nomare.  He 
was  only  a  youngster  —  twenty-two ;  he  had  to  be  to 
do  it.  It  was  off  the  peak  of  the  Pau-wi  Rock  —  one 
hundred  and  twenty-eight  feet  by  triangulation. 
A"  ^  he  couldn't  do  it  legitimately  or  technically  with 
a  swan-dive,  because  he  had  to  clear  two  lower  ledges 
while  he  was  in  the  air.  The  upper  ledge  of  the  two, 
by  their  own  traditions,  was  the  highest  the  best  of 
the  kanakas  had  ever  dared  since  their  traditions  be 
gan.  Well,  he  did  it.  He  became  tradition.  As 
long  as  the  kanakas  of  Huahoa  survive  he  will  remain 
tradition —  Get  ready,  Rita.  Start  on  the  full 


minute." 


14  It's  almost  a  shame  to  play  tricks  on  so  reputable 
a  swimmer,"  Paula  confided  to  them,  as  she  faced 
her  guest  down  the  length  of  the  tank  and  while  both 
waited  the  signal. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  159 

"  He  may  get  you  before  you  can  turn  the  trick," 
Dick  warned  again.  And  then,  to  Bert,  with  just  a 
shade  of  anxiety:  "Is  it  working  all  right?  Be 
cause  if  it  isn't,  Paula  will  have  a  bad  five  seconds 
getting  out  of  it." 

"  All  O.K.,"  Bert  assured.  "  I  went  in  myself. 
The  pipe  is  working.  There's  plenty  of  air." 

"Ready I"  Rita  called.     "Go!" 

Graham  ran  toward  their  end  like  a  foot-racer, 
while  Paula  darted  up  the  high  dive.  By  the  time 
she  had  gained  the  top  platform,  his  hands  and  feet 
were  on  the  lower  rungs.  When  he  was  half-way 
up  she  threatened  a  dive,  compelling  him  to  cease 
from  climbing  and  to  get  out  on  the  twenty-foot  plat 
form  ready  to  follow  her  to  the  water.  Whereupon 
she  laughed  down  at  him  and  did  not  dive. 

*  Time  is  passing  —  the  precious  seconds  are  tick 
ing  off,"  Ernestine  chanted. 

When  he  started  to  climb,  Paula  again  chased  him 
to  the  half-way  platform  with  a  threat  to  dive.  But 
not  many  seconds  did  Graham  waste.  His  next  start 
was  determined,  and  Paula,  poised  for  her  dive, 
could  not  send  him  scuttling  back.  He  raced  up 
ward  to  gain  the  thirty-foot  platform  before  she 
should  dive,  and  she  was  too  wise  to  linger.  Out 
into  space  she  launched,  head  back,  arms  bent,  hands 
close  to  chest,  legs  straight  and  close  together,  her 
body  balanced  horizontally  on  the  air  as  it  fell  out 
ward  and  downward. 

"  Oh  you  Annette  Kellerman !  "  Bert  Wainwright's 
admiring  cry  floated  up. 

Graham  ceased  pursuit  to  watch  the  completion 
of  the  dive,  and  saw  his  hostess,  a  few  feet  above 


160  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

the  water,  bend  her  head  forward,  straighten  out  her 
arms  and  lock  the  hands  to  form  the  arch  before 
her  head,  and,  so  shifting  the  balance  of  her  body, 
change  it  from  the  horizontal  to  the  perfect,  water- 
cleaving  angle. 

The  moment  she  entered  the  water,  he  swung  out 
on  the  thirty-foot  platform  and  waited.  From  this 
height  he  could  make  out  her  body  beneath  the  sur 
face  swimming  a  full  stroke  straight  for  the  far  end 
of  the  tank.  Not  till  then  did  he  dive.  He  was 
confident  that  he  could  outspeed  her,  and  his  dive, 
far  and  flat,  entered  him  in  the  water  twenty  feet 
beyond  her  entrance. 

But  at  the  instant  he  was  in,  Dick  dipped  two 
flat  rocks  into  the  water  and  struck  them  together. 
This  was  the  signal  for  Paula  to  change  her  course. 
Graham  heard  the  concussion  and  wondered.  He 
broke  surface  in  the  full  swing  of  the  crawl  and 
went  down  the  tank  to  the  far  end  at  a  killing  pace. 
He  pulled  himself  out  and  watched  the  surface  of 
the  tank.  A  burst  of  handclapping  from  the  girls 
drew  his  eyes  to  the  Little  Lady  drawing  herself  out 
of  the  tank  at  the  other  end. 

Again  he  ran  down  the  side  of  the  tank,  and  again 
she  climbed  the  scaffold.  But  this  time  his  wind 
and  endurance  enabled  him  to  cut  down  her  lead, 
so  that  she  was  driven  to  the  twenty-foot  platform. 
She  took  no  time  for  posturing  or  swanning,  but 
tilted  immediately  off  in  a  stiff  dive,  angling  toward 
the  west  side  of  the  tank.  Almost  they  were  in 
the  air  at  the  same  time.  In  the  water  and  under 
it,  he  could  feel  against  his  face  and  arms  the  agi 
tation  left  by  her  progress;  but  she  led  into  the  deep 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  161 

shadow  thrown  by  the  low  afternoon  sun,  where  the 
water  was  so  dark  he  could  see  nothing. 

When  he  touched  the  side  of  the  tank  he  came 
up.  She  was  not  in  sight.  He  drew  himself  out, 
panting,  and  stood  ready  to  dive  in  at  the  first  sign 
of  her.  But  there  were  no  signs. 

"  Seven  minutes!"  Rita  called.  "And  a  half! 
.  .  .  Eight!  ...  And  a  half!" 

And  no  Paula  Forrest  broke  surface.  Gra 
ham  refused  to  be  alarmed  because  he  could  see  no 
alarm  on  the  faces  of  the  others. 

"  I  lose,"  he  announced  at  Rita's  "  Nine  minutes !  " 

u  She's  been  under  over  two  minutes,  and  you're 
all  too  blessed  calm  about  it  to  get  me  excited,"  he 
said.  "  I've  still  a  minute  —  maybe  I  don't  lose," 
he  added  quickly,  as  he  stepped  off  feet  first  into  the 
tank. 

As  he  went  down  he  turned  over  and  explored  the 
cement  wall  of  tank  with  his  hands.  Midway,  pos 
sibly  ten  feet  under  the  surface  he  estimated,  his 
hands  encountered  an  opening  in  the  wall.  He 
felt  about,  learned  it  was  unscreened,  and  boldly  en 
tered.  Almost  before  he  was  in,  he  found  he  could 
come  up;  but  he  came  up  slowly,  breaking  surface 
in  pitchy  blackness  and  feeling  about  him  without 
splashing. 

His  fingers  touched  a  cool  smooth  arm  that  shrank 
convulsively  at  contact  while  the  possessor  of  it  cried 
sharply  with  the  startle  of  fright.  He  held  on 
tightly  and  began  to  laugh,  and  Paula  laughed  with 
him.  A  line  from  "  The  First  Chanty  "  flashed  into 
his  consciousness  — "  Hearing  her  laugh  in  the  gloom 
greatly  I  loved  her." 


1 62  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  You  did  frighten  me  when  you  touched  me," 
she  said.  "  You  came  without  a  sound,  and  I  was 
a  thousand  miles  away,  dreaming  .  .  ." 

<  What?"  Graham  asked. 

;<  Well,  honestly,  I  had  just  got  an  idea  for  a 
gown  —  a  dusty,  musty,  mulberry-wine  velvet,  with 
long,  close  lines,  and  heavy,  tarnished  gold  borders 
and  cords  and  things.  And  the  only  jewelery  a 
ring  —  one  enormous  pigeon-blood  ruby  that  Dick 
gave  me  years  ago  when  we  sailed  the  All  Away" 

"  Is  there  anything  you  don't  do  ?  "  he  laughed. 

She  joined  with  him,  and  their  mirth  sounded 
strangely  hollow  in  the  pent  and  echoing  dark. 

4  Who  told  you?  "  she  next  asked. 

"  No  one.  After  you  had  been  under  two  min 
utes  I  knew  it  had  to  be  something  like  this,  and  I 
came  exploring." 

"  It  was  Dick's  idea.  He  had  it  built  into  the 
tank  afterward.  You  will  find  him  full  of  whimsies. 
He  delighted  in  scaring  old  ladies  into  fits  by  stepping 
off  into  the  tank  with  their  sons  or  grandsons  and 
hiding  away  in  here.  But  after  one  or  two  nearly 
died  of  shock  —  old  ladies,  I  mean  —  he  put  me  up, 
as  to-day,  to  fooling  hardier  persons  like  yourself. 
—  Oh,  he  had  another  accident.  There  was  a  Miss 
Coghlan,  friend  of  Ernestine,  a  little  seminary  girl. 
They  artfully  stood  her  right  beside  the  pipe  that 
leads  out,  and  Dick  went  off  the  high  dive  and  swam 
in  here  to  the  inside  end  of  the  pipe.  After  several 
minutes,  by  the  time  she  was  in  collapse  over  his 
drowning,  he  spoke  up  the  pipe  to  her  in  most  hor 
rible,  sepulchral  tones.  And  right  there  Miss 
Coghlan  fainted  dead  away." 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  163 

"  She  must  have  been  a  weak  sister,"  Graham  com 
mented;  while  he  struggled  with  a  wanton  desire 
for  a  match  so  that  he  could  strike  it  and  see  how 
Paula  Forrest  looked  paddling  there  beside  him  to 
keep  afloat. 

"  She  had  a  fair  measure  of  excuse,"  Paula  an 
swered.  u  She  was  a  young  thing  —  eighteen;  and 
she  had  a  sort  of  school-girl  infatuation  for  Dick. 
They  all  get  it.  You  see,  he's  such  a  boy  when  he's 
playing  that  they  can't  realize  that  he's  a  hard-bitten, 
hard-working,  deep-thinking,  mature,  elderly  bene 
dict.  The  embarrassing  thing  was  that  the  little 
girl,  when  she  was  first  revived  and  before  she  could 
gather  her  wits,  exposed  all  her  secret  heart.  Dick's 
face  was  a  study  while  she  babbled  her  - 

"  Well?  —  going  to  stay  there  all  night?  "  Bert 
Wainwright's  voice  came  down  the  pipe,  sounding 
megaphonically  close. 

"  Heavens!  "  Graham  sighed  with  relief;  for  he 
had  startled  and  clutched  Paula's  arm.  *  That's  the 
time  I  got  my  fright.  The  little  maiden  is  avenged. 
Also,  at  last,  I  know  what  a  lead-pipe  cinch  is." 

"  And  it's  time  we  started  for  the  outer  world," 
she  suggested.  "  It's  not  the  coziest  gossiping  place 
in  the  world.  Shall  I  go  first?  " 

"  By  all  means  —  and  I'll  be  right  behind;  al 
though  it's  a  pity  the  water  isn't  phosphorescent. 
Then  I  could  follow  your  incandescent  heel  like  that 
chap  Byron  wrote  about  —  don't  you  remember?'1 

He  heard  her  appreciative  gurgle  in  the  dark,  and 
then  her:  "Well,  I'm  going  now." 

Unable  to  see  the  slightest  glimmer,  nevertheless, 
from  the  few  sounds  she  made  he  knew  she  had 


1 64  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

turned  over  and  gone  down  head  first,  and  he  was 
not  beyond  visioning  with  inner  sight  the  graceful 
way  in  which  she  had  done  it  —  an  anything  but 
graceful  feat  as  the  average  swimming  woman  ac 
complishes  it. 

"  Somebody  gave  it  away  to  you,"  was  Bert's 
prompt  accusal,  when  Graham  rose  to  the  surface 
of  the  tank  and  climbed  out. 

"  And  you  were  the  scoundrel  who  rapped  stone 
under  water,"  Graham  challenged.  "  If  I'd  lost  I'd 
have  protested  the  bet.  It  was  a  crooked  game,  a 
conspiracy,  and  competent  counsel,  I  am  confident, 
would  declare  it  a  felony.  It's  a  case  for  the  district 
attorney." 

"  But  you  won,"  Ernestine  cried. 

"  I  certainly  did,  and,  therefore,  I  shall  not  prose 
cute  you,  nor  any  one  of  your  crooked  gang  —  if  the 
bets  are  paid  promptly.  Let  me  see  —  you  owe  me 
a  box  of  cigars  — " 

"  One  cigar,  sir !  " 

"A  box!     A  box!" 

"Cross  tag!"  Paula  cried.  "  Let's  play  cross- 
tag!  —  You're  IT!" 

Suiting  action  to  word,  she  tagged  Graham  on  the 
shoulder  and  plunged  into  the  tank.  Before  he  could 
follow,  Bert  seized  him,  whirled  him  in  a  circle,  was 
himself  tagged,  and  tagged  Dick  before  he  could  es 
cape.  And  while  Dick  pursued  his  wife  through  the 
tank  and  Bert  and  Graham  sought  a  chance  to  cross, 
the  girls  fled  up  the  scaffold  and  stood  in  an  enticing 
row  on  the  fifteen-foot  diving  platform. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

AN  indifferent  swimmer,  Donald  Ware  had 
avoided  the  afternoon  sport  in  the  tank;  but 
after  dinner,  somewhat  to  the  irritation  of 
Graham,  the  violinist  monopolized  Paula  at  the  pi 
ano.  New  guests,  with  the  casual  expectedness  of 
the  Big  House,  had  drifted  in  —  a  lawyer,  by  name 
Adolph  Weil,  who  had  come  to  confer  with  Dick 
over  some  big  water-right  suit;  Jeremy  Braxton, 
straight  from  Mexico,  Dick's  general  superintendent 
of  the  Harvest  Group,  which  bonanza,  according  to 
Jeremy  Braxton,  was  as  "  unpetering  "  as  ever;  Ed 
win  O'Hay,  a  red-headed  Irish  musical  and  dramatic 
critic;  and  Chauncey  Bishop,  editor  and  owner  of 
the  San  Francisco  Dispatch,  and  a  member  of  Dick's 
class  and  frat,  as  Graham  gleaned. 

Dick  had  started  a  boisterous  gambling  game 
which  he  called  "  Horrible  Fives,"  wherein,  although 
excitement  ran  high  and  players  plunged,  the  limit 
was  ten  cents,  and,  on  a  lucky  coup,  the  transient 
banker  might  win  or  lose  as  high  as  ninety  cents, 
such  coup  requiring  at  least  ten  minutes  to  play  out. 
This  game  went  on  at  a  big  table  at  the  far  end  of 
the  room,  accompanied  by  much  owing  and  borrow 
ing  of  small  sums  and  an  incessant  clamor  for  change. 

With  nine  players,  the  game  was  crowded,  and 
Graham,  rather  than  draw  cards,  casually  and  oc 
casionally  backed  Ernestine's  cards,  the  while  he 

165 


1 66  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

glanced  down  the  long  room  at  the  violinist  and 
Paula  Forrest  absorbed  in  Beethoven  Symphonies 
and  Delibes'  Ballets.  Jeremy  Braxton  was  demand 
ing  raising  the  limit  to  twenty  cents,  and  Dick,  the 
heaviest  loser,  as  he  averred,  to  the  tune  of  four  dol 
lars  and  sixty  cents,  was  plaintively  suggesting  the 
starting  of  a  "  kitty  "  in  order  that  some  one  should 
pay  for  the  lights  and  the  sweeping  out  of  the  place 
in  the  morning,  when  Graham,  with  a  profound  sigh 
at  the  loss  of  his  last  bet  —  a  nickel  which  he  had 
had  to  pay  double  —  announced  to  Ernestine  that 
he  was  going  to  take  a  turn  around  the  room  to 
change  his  luck. 

"  I  prophesied  you  would,"  she  told  him  under  her 
breath. 

"What?  "he  asked. 

She  glanced  significantly  in  Paula's  direction. 

'  Just  for  that  I  simply  must  go  down  there  now," 
he  retorted. 

"  Can't  dast  decline  a  dare,"  she  taunted. 

;<  If  it  were  a  dare  I  wouldn't  dare  do  it." 

;t  In  which  case  I  dare  you,"  she  took  up. 

He  shook  his  head:  "  I  had  already  made  up 
my  mind  to  go  right  down  there  to  that  one  spot  and 
cut  that  fiddler  out  of  the  running.  You  can't  dare 
me  out  of  it  at  this  late  stage.  Besides,  there's  Mr. 
O'Hay  waiting  for  you  to  make  your  bet." 

Ernestine  rashly  laid  ten  cents,  and  scarcely 
knew  whether  she  won  or  lost,  so  intent  was  she  on 
watching  Graham  go  down  the  room,  although  she 
did  know  that  Bert  Wainwright  had  not  been  un 
observant  of  her  gaze  and  its  direction.  On  the 
other  hand,  neither  she  nor  Bert,  nor  any  other  at  the 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  167 

table,  knew  that  Dick's  quick-glancing  eyes,  sparkling 
with  merriment  while  his  lips  chaffed  absurdities  that 
made  them  all  laugh,  had  missed  no  portion  of  the 
side  play. 

Ernestine,  but  little  taller  than  Paula,  although 
hinting  of  a  plus  roundness  to  come,  w*as  a  sun- 
healthy,  clear  blonde,  her  skin  sprayed  with  the  al 
most  transparent  flush  of  maidenhood  at  eighteen. 
To  the  eye,  it  seemed  almost  that  one  could  see 
through  the  pink  daintiness  of  fingers,  hand,  wris£ 
and  forearm,  neck  and  cheek.  And  to  this  delicious 
transparency  of  rose  and  pink,  was  added  a  warmth 
of  tone  that  did  not  escape  Dick's  eyes  as  he  glimpsed 
her  watch  Evan  Graham  move  down  the  length  of 
room.  Dick  knew  and  classified  her  wild  imagined 
dream  or  guess,  though  the  terms  of  it  were  beyond 
his  divination. 

What  she  saw  was  what  she  imagined  was  the 
princely  walk  of  Graham,  the  high,  light,  blooded 
carriage  of  his  head,  the  delightful  carelessness  of 
the  gold-burnt,  sun-sanded  hair  that  made  her  fingers 
ache  to  be  into  with  caresses  she  for  the  first  time 
knew  were  possible  of  her  fingers. 

Nor  did  Paula,  during  an  interval  of  discussion 
with  the  violinist  in  which  she  did  not  desist  from 
stating  her  criticism  of  O'Hay's  latest  criticism  of 
Harold  Bauer,  fail  to  see  and  keep  her  eyes  on 
Graham's  progress.  She,  too,  noted  with  pleasure 
his  grace  of  movement,  the  high,  light  poise  of  head, 
the  careless  hair,  the  clear  bronze  of  the  smooth 
cheeks,  the  splendid  forehead,  the  long  gray  eyes 
with  the  hint  of  drooping  lids  and  boyish  sullenness 
that  fled  before  the  smile  with  which  he  greeted  her. 


1 68  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

She  had  observed  that  smile  often  since  her  first 
meeting  with  him.  It  was  an  irresistible  smile,  a 
smile  that  lighted  the  eyes  with  the  radiance  of  good 
fellowship  and  that  crinkled  the  corners  into  tiny, 
genial  lines.  It  was  provocative  of  smiles,  for  she 
found  herself  smiling  a  silent  greeting  in  return  as 
she  continued  stating  to  Ware  her  grievance  against 
O'Hay's  too-complacent  praise  of  Bauer. 

But  her  engagement  was  tacitly  with  Donald  Ware 
at  the  piano,  and  with  no  more  than  passing  speech, 
she  was  off  and  away  in  a  series  of  Hungarian  dances 
that  made  Graham  marvel  anew  as  he  loafed  and 
smoked  in  a  window-seat. 

He  marveled  at  the  proteanness  of  her,  at  visions 
of  those  nimble  fingers  guiding  and  checking  The 
Fop,  swimming  and  paddling  in  submarine  crypts, 
and,  falling  in  swan-like  flight  through  forty  feet  of 
air,  locking  just  above  the  water  to  make  the  diver's 
head-protecting  arch  of  arm. 

In  decency,  he  lingered  but  few  minutes,  returned 
to  the  gamblers,  and  put  the  entire  table  in  a  roar 
with  a  well-acted  Yiddisher's  chagrin  and  passion  at 
losing  entire  nickels  every  few  minutes  to  the  for 
tunate  and  chesty  mine  superintendent  from  Mexico. 

Later,  when  the  game  of  Horrible  Fives  broke  up, 
Bert  and  Lute  Desten  spoiled  the  Adagio  from 
Beethoven's  Sonata  Pathetique  by  exaggeratedly  rag 
ging  to  it  in  what  Dick  immediately  named  "  The 
Loving  Slow-Drag,"  till  Paula  broke  down  in  a 
gale  of  laughter  and  ceased  from  playing. 

New  groupings  occurred.  A  bridge  table  formed 
with  Weil,  Rita,  Bishop,  and  Dick.  Donald  Ware 
was  driven  from  his  monopoly  of  Paula  by  the  young 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  169 

people  under  the  leadership  of  Jeremy  Braxton; 
while  Graham  and  O'Hay  paired  off  in  a  window-seat 
and  O'Hay  talked  shop. 

After  a  time,  in  which  all  at  the  piano  had  sung 
Hawaiian  hulas,  Paula  sang  alone  to  her  own  ac 
companiment.  She  sang  several  German  love-songs 
in  succession,  although  it  was  merely  for  the  group 
about  her  and  not  for  the  room ;  and  Evan  Graham^ 
almost  to  his  delight,  decided  that  at  last  he  had" 
found  a  weakness  in  her.  She  might  be  a  magnifi 
cent  pianist,  horsewoman,  diver,  and  swimmer,  but  it 
was  patent,  despite  her  singing  throat,  that  she  was 
not  a  magnificent  singer.  This  conclusion  he  was 
quickly  compelled  to  modify.  A  singer  she  was,  a 
consummate  singer.  Weakness  was  only  compara 
tive  after  all.  She  lacked  the  magnificent  voice.  It  \ 
was  a  sweet  voice,  a  rich  voice,  with  the  same  warm- 
fibered  thrill  of  her  laugh;  but  the  volume  so  essen 
tial  to  the  great  voice  was  not  there.  Ear  and  voice 
seemed  effortlessly  true,  and  in  her  singing  were 
feeling,  artistry,  training,  intelligence.  But  volume 
—  it  was  scarcely  a  fair  average,  was  his  judgment. 

But  quality  —  there  he  halted.  It  was  a  woman's 
voice.  It  was  haunted  with  richness  of  sex.  In  it 
resided  all  the  temperament  in  the  world  —  with  all 
the  restraint  of  discipline,  was  the  next  step  of  his 
analysis.  He  had  to  admire  the  way  she  refused 
to  exceed  the  limitations  of  her  voice.  In  this  she 
achieved  triumphs. 

And,  while  he  nodded  absently  to  O'Hay's 
lecturette  on  the  state  of  the  opera,  Graham  fell  to 
wondering  if  Paula  Forrest,  thus  so  completely  the 
mistress  of  her  temperament,  might  not  be  equally 


1 70  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

mistress  of  her  temperament  in  the  deeper,  passional 
ways.  There  was  a  challenge  there  —  based  on 
curiosity,  he  conceded,  but  only  partly  so  based ;  and, 
over  and  beyond,  and,  deeper  and  far  beneath,  a 
challenge  to  a  man  made  in  the  immemorial  image 
of  man. 

It  was  a  challenge  that  bade  him  pause,  and  even 
look  up  and  down  the  great  room  and  to  the  tree- 
trunked  roof  far  above,  and  to  the  flying  gallery 
hung  with  the  spoils  of  the  world,  and  to  Dick  For 
rest,  master  of  all  this  material  achievement  and 
husband  of  the  woman,  playing  bridge,  just  as  he 
worked,  with  all  his  heart,  his  laughter  ringing  loud 
as  he  caught  Rita  in  renig.  For  Graham  had  the 
courage  not  to  shun  the  ultimate  connotations.  Be- 
kind  the  challenge  in  his  speculations  lurked 
''Oman.  Paula  Forrest  was  splendidly,  deliciously 
woman,  all  woman,  unusually  woman.  From 
blow  between  the  eyes  of  his  first  striking  sjght  of  her, 
swimming  the  great  stallion  in  the  pool,  she  had 
:ontinued  to  witch-ride  his  man's  imagination.  He 
anything  but  unused  to  women;  and  his  general 
ittitude  was  that  of  being  tired  of  the  mediocre 
jameness  of  them.  To  chance  upon  the  unusual 
woman  was  like  finding  the  great  pearl  in  a  lagoon 
fished  out  by  a  generation  of  divers. 

"  Glad  to  see  you're  still  alive,"  Paula  laughed  to 
him,  a  little  later. 

She  was  prepared  to  depart  with  Lute  for  bed.  A 
second  bridge  quartet  had  been  arranged  —  Ernes 
tine,  Bert,  Jeremy  Braxton,  and  Graham;  while 
O'Hay  and  Bishop  were  already  deep  in  a  bout  of 
two-handed  pinochle. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  171 

"  He's  really  a  charming  Irishman  when  he  keeps 
off  his  one  string,"  Paula  went  on. 

"Which,  I  think  I  am  fair,  is  music/'  Graham 
said. 

"  And  on  music  he  is  insufferable,"  Lute  observed. 
"  It's  the  only  thing  he  doesn't  know  the  least  thing 
about.  He  drives  one  frantic." 

"  Never  mind,"  Paula  soothed,  in  gurgling  tones. 
"  You  will  all  be  avenged.  Dick  just  whispered  to 
me  to  get  the  philosophers  up  to-morrow  night. 
You  know  how  they  talk  music.  A  musical  critic 
is  their  awful  prey." 

"  Terrence  said  the  other  night  that  there  was 
no  closed  season  on  musical  critics,"  Lute  con 
tributed. 

"  Terrence  and  Aaron  will  drive  him  to  drink," 
Paula  laughed  her  joy  of  anticipation.  "  And  Dar 
Hyal,  alone,  with  his  blastic  theory  of  art,  can 
specially  apply  it  to  music  to  the  confutation  of  all 
the  first  words  and  the  last.  He  doesn't  believe  a 
thing  he  says  about  blastism,  any  more  than  was  he 
serious  when  he  danced  the  other  evening.  It's  his 
bit  of  fun.  He's  such  a  deep  philosopher  that  he 
has  to  get  his  fun  somehow." 

"  And  if  O'Hay  ever  locks  horns  with  Terrence," 
Lute  prophesied,  "  I  can  see  Terrence  tucking  arm 
in  arm  with  him,  leading  him  down  to  the  stag  room, 
and  heating  the  argument  with  the  absentest-minded 
variety  of  drinks  that  ever  O'Hay  accomplished." 

"  Which  means  a  very  sick  O'Hay  next  day," 
Paula  continued  her  gurgles  of  anticipation. 

"  I'll  tell  him  to  do  it !  "  exclaimed  Lute. 

"  You  mustn't  think  we're  all  bad,"  Paula  pro- 


172  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

tested  to  Graham.  "  It's  just  the  spirit  of  the  house. 
Dick  likes  it.  He's  always  playing  jokes  himself. 
He  relaxes  that  way.  I'll  wager,  right  now,  it  was 
Dick's  suggestion,  to  Lute,  and  for  Lute  to  carry 
out,  for  Terrence  to  get  O'Hay  into  the  stag  room. 
Now,  'fess  up,  Lute." 

"  Well,  I  will  say,"  Lute  answered  with  meticulous 
circumspection,  "  that  the  idea  was  not  entirely 
original  with  me." 

At  this  point,  Ernestine  joined  them  and  appro 
priated  Graham  with : 

'  We're  all  waiting  for  you.  We've  cut,  and  you 
and  I  are  partners.  Besides,  Paula's  making  her 
sleep  noise.  So  say  good  night,  and  let  her  go." 

Paula  had  left  for  bed  at  ten  o'clock.  Not  till 
one  did  the  bridge  break  up.  Dick,  his  arm  about 
Ernestine  in  brotherly  fashion,  said  good  night  to 
Graham  where  one  of  the  divided  ways  led  to  the 
watch  tower,  and  continued  on  with  his  pretty  sis 
ter-in-law  toward  her  quarters. 

"  Just  a  tip,  Ernestine,"  he  said  at  parting,  his 
gray  eyes  frankly  and  genially  on  hers,  bnt  his  voice 
sufficiently  serious  to  warn  her. 

"What  have  I  been  doing  now?"  she  pouted 
laughingly. 

u  Nothing  ...  as  yet.  But  don't  get  started,  or 
you'll  be  laying  up  a  sore  heart  for  yourself.  You're 
only  a  kid  yet  —  eighteen ;  and  a  darned  nice,  likable 
kid  at  that.  Enough  to  make  'most  any  man  sit  up 
and  take  notice.  But  Evan  Graham  is  not  'most 
any  man  • — " 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  173 

"  Oh,  I  can  take  care  of  myself,"  she  blurted  out 
in  a  fling  of  quick  resentment 

"  But  listen  to  me  just  the  same.  There  comes  a 
time  in  the  affairs  of  a  girl  when  the  love-bee  gets  a 
buzzing  with  a  very  loud  hum  in  her  pretty  noddle. 
Then  is  the  time  she  mustn't  make  a  mistake  and 
start  in  loving  the  wrong  man.  You  haven't  fallen 
in  love  with  Evan  Graham  yet,  and  all  you  have  to 
do  is  just  not  to  fall  in  love  with  him.  He's  not 
for  you,  nor  for  any  young  thing.  He's  an  oldster, 
an  ancient,  and  possibly  has  forgotten  more  about 
love,  romantic  love,  and  young  things,  than  you'll 
ever  learn  in  a  dozen  lives.  If  he  ever  marries 
again  — " 

u  Again !  "  Ernestine  broke  in. 

"  Why,  he's  been  a  widower,  my  dear,  for  over 
fifteen  years." 

'  Then  what  of  it?  "  she  demanded  defiantly. 

"  Just  this,"  Dick  continued  quietly.  "  He's  lived 
the  young-thing  romance,  and  lived  it  wonderfully; 
and,  from  the  fact  that  in  fifteen  years  he  has"  not 
married  again,  means  — " 

"That  he's  never  recovered  from  his  loss?r 
Ernestine  interpolated.  "  But  that's  no  proof — " 

11 —  Means  that  he's  got  over  his  apprenticeship 
to  wild  young  romance,"  Dick  held  on  steadily. 
"  All  you  have  to  do  is  look  at  him  and  realize  that 
he  has  not  lacked  opportunities,  and  that,  on  oc 
casion,  some  very  fine  women,  real  wise  women, 
mature  women,  have  given  him  foot-races  that  tested 
his  wind  and  endurance.  But  so  far  they've  not  suc 
ceeded  in  catching  him.  And  as  for  young  things, 


i74  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

you  know  how  filled  the  world  is  with  them  for  a 
man  like  him.  Think  it  over,  and  just  keep  your 
heart-thoughts  away  from  him.  If  you  don't  let 
your  heart  start  to  warm  toward  him,  it  will  save 
your  heart  from  a  grievous  chill  later  on." 

He  took  one  of  her  hands  in  his,  and  drew  her 
against  him,  an  arm  soothingly  about  her  shoulder. 
For  several  minutes  of  silence  Dick  idly  speculated 
on  what  her  thoughts  might  be. 

"  You  know,  we  hard-bitten  old  fellows  — "  he  be 
gan  half-apologetically,  half-humorously. 

But  she  made  a  restless  movement  of  distaste,  and 
cried  out: 

"  Are  the  only  ones  worth  while !  The  young 
men  are  all  youngsters,  and  that's  what's  the  matter 
with  them.  They're  full  of  life,  and  coltish  spirits, 
and  dance,  and  song.  But  they're  -not  serious. 
They're  not  big.  They're  not  —  oh,  they  don't  give 
a  girl  that  sense  of  all-wiseness,  of  proven  strength, 
of,  of  ...  well,  of  manhood." 

"  I  understand,"  Dick  murmured.  "  But  please 
do  not  forget  to  glance  at  the  other  side  of  the  shield. 
You  glowing  young  creatures  of  women  must  affect 
the  old  fellows  in  precisely  similar  ways.  They  may 
look  on  you  as  toys,  playthings,  delightful  things  to 
whom  to  teach  a  few  fine  foolishnesses,  but  not  as 
comrades,  not  as  equals,  not  as  sharers  —  full 
sharers.  Life  is  something  to  be  learned.  They 
have  learned  it  ...  some  of  it.  But  young  things 
like  you,  Ernestine,  have  you  learned  any  of  it  yet?  " 

"  Tell  me,"  she  asked  abruptly,  almost  tragically, 
"  about  this  wild  young  romance,  about  this  young 
thing  when  he  was  young,  fifteen  years  ago." 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  175 


"  Fifteen?  "  Dick  replied  promptly.  "  Eighteen. 
They  were  married  three  years  before  she  died.  In 
fact  —  figure  it  out  for  yourself  —  they  were 
actually  married,  by  a  Church  of  England  dominie, 
and  living  in  wedlock,  about  the  same  moment  that 
you  were  squalling  your  first  post-birth  squalls  in  this 
world." 

"  Yes,  yes  —  go  on,"  she  urged  nervously. 
"  What  was  she  like?" 

"  She  was  a  resplendent,  golden-brown,  or  tan- 
golden  half-caste,  a  Polynesian  queen  whose  mother 
had  been  a  queen  before  her,  whose  father  was  an 
Oxford  man,  an  English  gentleman,  and  a  real 
scholar.  Her  name  was  Nomare.  She  was  Queen 
of  Huahoa.  She  was  barbaric.  He  was  young 
enough  to  out-barbaric  her.  There  was  nothing  sor 
did  in  their  marriage.  He  was  no  penniless  adven 
turer.  She  brought  him  her  island  kingdom  and 
forty  thousand  subjects.  He  brought  to  that  island 
his  fortune  —  and  it  was  no  inconsiderable  fortune. 
He  built  a  palace  that  no  South  Sea  island  ever 
possessed  before  or  will  ever  possess  again.  It  was 
the  real  thing,  grass-thatched,  hand-hewn  beams  that 
were  lashed  with  cocoanut  sennit,  and  all  the  rest. 
It  was  rooted  in  the  island;  it  sprouted  out  of  the 
island;  it  belonged,  although  he  fetched  Hopkins  out 
from  New  York  to  plan  it. 

"  Heavens !  they  had  their  own  royal  yacht,  their 
mountain  house,  their  canoe  house  —  the  last  a 
veritable  palace  in  itself.  I  know.  I  have  been  at 
great  feasts  in  it  —  though  it  was  after  their  time. 
Nomare  was  dead,  and  no  one  knew  where  Graham 
was,  and  a  king  of  collateral  line  was  the  ruler. 


i76  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  I  told  you  he  out-barb  a  ricked  her.  Their  din 
ner  service  was  gold. —  Oh,  what's  the  use  in  tell 
ing  any  more.  He  was  only  a  boy.  She  was  half- 
English,  half-Polynesian,  and  a  really  and  truly 
queen.  They  were  flowers  of  their  races.  They 
were  a  pair  of  wonderful  children.  They  lived  a 
fairy  tale.  And  .  .  .  well,  Ernestine,  the  years 
have  passed,  and  Evan  Graham  has  passed  from  the 
realm  of  the  young  thing.  It  will  be  a  remarkable 
woman  that  will  ever  infatuate  him  now.  Besides, 
he's  practically  broke.  Though  he  didn't  wastrel 
his  money.  As  much  misfortune,  and  more,  than 
anything  else." 

"  Paula  would  be  more  his  kind,"  Ernestine  said 
meditatively. 

"  Yes,  indeed,"  Dick  agreed.  "  Paula,  or  any 
woman  as  remarkable  as  Paula,  would  attract  him  a 
thousand  times  more  than  all  the  sweet,  young,  lovely 
things  like  you  in  the  world.  We  oldsters  have  our 
standards,  you  know." 

"  And  I'll  have  to  put  up  with  the  youngsters," 
Ernestine  sighed. 

"  In  the  meantime,  yes,"  he  chuckled.  "  Remem 
bering,  always,  that  you,  too,  in  time,  may  grow  into 
the  remarkable,  mature  woman,  who  can  outfoot  a 
man  like  Evan  in  a  foot-race  of  love  for  possession." 

"  But  I  shall  be  married  long  before  that,"  she 
pouted. 

"  Which  will  be  your  good  fortune,  my  dear. 
And,  now,  good  night.  And  you  are  not  angry  with 
me?" 

che  smiled  pathetically  and  shook  her  head,  put 
lips  to  be  kissed,  then  said  as  they  parted: 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  177 

"  I  promise  not  to  be  angry  if  you  will  only  show 
me  the  way  that  in  the  end  will  lead  me  to  ancient 
graybeards  like  you  and  Graham." 

Dick  Forrest,  turning  off  lights  as  he  went,  pene 
trated  the  library,  and,  while  selecting  half  a  dozen 
reference  volumes  on  mechanics  and  physics,  smiled 
as  if  pleased  with  himself  at  recollection  of  the  inter 
view  with  his  sister-in-law.  He  was  confident  that 
he  had  spoken  in  time  and  not  a  moment  too  soon. 
But,  half  way  up  the  book-concealed  spiral  staircase 
that  led  to  his  work  room,  a  remark  of  Ernestine, 
echoing  in  his  consciousness,  made  him  stop  from 
very  suddenness  to  lean  his  shoulder  against  the 
wall. —  "Paula  would  be  more  his  kind." 

"  Silly  ass!  "  he  laughed  aloud,  continuing  on  his 
way.  u  And  married  a  dozen  years !  " 

Nor  did  he  think  again  about  it,  until,  in  bed,  on 
his  sleeping  porch,  he  took  a  glance  at  his  barometers 
and  thermometers,  and  prepared  to  settle  down  to 
the  solution  of  the  electrical  speculation  that  had 
been  puzzling  him.  Then  it  was,  as  he  peered  across 
the  great  court  to  his  wife's  dark  wing  and  dark 
sleeping  porch  to  see  if  she  were  still  waking,  that 
Ernestine's  remark  again  echoed.  He  dismissed  it 
with  a  "  Silly  ass!  "  of  scorn,  lighted  a  cigarette,  and 
began  running,  with  trained  eye,  the  indexes  of  the 
books  and  marking  the  pages  sought  with  matches. 


CHAPTER  XV 

IT  was  long  after  ten  in  the  morning,  when 
Graham,  straying  about  restlessly  and  won 
dering  if  Paula  Forrest  ever  appeared  before 
the  middle  of  the  day,  wandered  into  the  music  room. 
Despite  the  fact  that  he  was  a  several  days'  guest 
in  the  Big  House,  so  big  was  it  that  the  music  room 
was  new  territory.  It  was  an  exquisite  room,  pos 
sibly  thirty-five  by  sixty  and  rising  to  a  lofty  trussed 
ceiling  where  a  warm  golden  light  was  diffused  from 
a  skylight  of  yellow  glass.  Red  tones  entered 
largely  into  the  walls  and  furnishing,  and  the  place, 
to  him,  seemed  to  hold  the  hush  of  music. 

Graham  was  lazily  contemplating  a  Keith  with  its 
inevitable  triumph  of  sun-gloried  atmosphere  and 
twilight-shadowed  sheep,  when,  from  the  tail  of  his 
eye,  he  saw  his  hostess  come  in  from  the  far  en 
trance.  Again,  the  sight  of  her,  that  was  a  picture, 
gave  him  the  little  catch-breath  of  gasp.  She  was 
clad  entirely  in  white,  and  looked  very  young  and 
quite  tall  in  the  sweeping  folds  of  a  holoku  of  elab 
orate  simplicity  and  apparent  shapelessness.  He 
knew  the  holoku  in  the  home  of  its  origin,  where, 
on  the  lanais  of  Hawaii,  it  gave  charm  to  a  plain 
woman  and  double-folded  the  charm  of  a  charming 
woman. 

While  they  smiled  greeting  across  the  room,  he 
was  noting  the  set  of  her  body,  the  poise  of  head 

178 


THE  LITTLE  LADY  179 

and  frankness  of  eyes  —  all  of  which  seemed  articu 
late  with  a  friendly,  comradely,  "  Hello,  friends." 
At  least  such  was  the  form  Graham's  fancy  took  as 
she  came  toward  him. 

"  You  made  a  mistake  with  this  room,"  he  said 
gravely. 

"  No,  don't  say  that !     But  how  ?  " 

"  It  should  have  been  longer,  much  longer,  twice 
as  long  at  least." 

"Why?"  she  demanded,  with  a  disapproving 
shake  of  head,  while  he  delighted  in  the  girlish  color 
in  her  cheeks  that  gave  the  lie  to  her  thirty-eight 
years. 

"  Because,  then,"  he  answered,  "  you  should  have 
had  to  walk  twice  as  far  this  morning  and  my  pleas 
ure  of  watching  you  would  have  been  correspond 
ingly  increased.  I've  always  insisted  that  the  holoku 
is  the  most  charming  garment  ever  invented  for 


women." 


'  Then  it  was  my  holoku  and  not  I,"  she  retorted. 
"  I  see  you  are  like  Dick  —  always  with  a  string  on 
your  compliments,  and  lo,  when  we  poor  sillies  start 
to  nibble,  back  goes  the  compliment  dragging  at  the 
end  of  the  string. 

"  Now  I  want  to  show  you  the  room,"  she  hurried 
on,  closing  his  disclaimer.  "  Dick  gave  me  a  free 
hand  with  it.  It's  all  mine,  you  see,  even  to  its 
proportions." 

"  And  the  pictures?" 

"  I  selected  them,"  she  nodded,  "  every  one  of 
them,  and  loved  them  onto  the  walls  myself.  Al 
though  Dick  did  quarrel  with  me  over  that  Verescha- 
gin.  He  agreed  on  the  two  Millets  and  the  Corot 


i8o  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

over  there,  and  on  that  Isabey;  and  even  conceded 
that  some  Vereschagins  might  do  in  a  music  room, 
but  not  that  particular  Vereschagin.  He's  jealous 
for  our  local  artists,  you  see.  He  wanted  more  of 
them,  wanted  to  show  his  appreciation  of  home 
talent." 

"  I  don't  know  your  Pacific  Coast  men's  work  very 
well,"  Graham  said.  "  Tell  me  about  them.  Show 
me  that  —  Of  course,  that's  a  Keith,  there ;  but 
whose  is  that  next  one?  It's  beautiful." 

"  A  McComas — "  she  was  answering;  and 
Graham,  with  a  pleasant  satisfaction,  was  settling 
himself  to  a  half-hour's  talk  on  pictures,  when  Don 
ald  Ware  entered  with  questing  eyes  that  lighted  up 
at  sight  of  the  Little  Lady. 

His  violin  was  under  his  arm,  and  he  crossed  to 
the  piano  in  a  brisk,  business-like  way  and  proceeded 
to  lay  out  music. 

"  We're  going  to  work  till  lunch,"  Paula  explained 
to  Graham.  "  He  swears  I'm  getting  abominably 
rusty,  and  I  think  he's  half  right.  We'll  see  you  at 
lunch.  You  can  stay  if  you  care,  of  course;  but  I 
warn  you  it's  really  going  to  be  work.  And  we're 
going  swimming  this  afternoon.  Four  o'clock  at  the 
tank,  Dick  says.  Also,  he  says  he's  got  a  new  song 
he's  going  to  sing  then. —  What  time  is  it,  Mr. 
Ware?" 

"  Ten  minutes  to  eleven,"  the  musician  answered 
briefly,  with  a  touch  of  sharpness. 

"  You're  ahead  of  time  —  the  engagement  was  for 
eleven.  And  till  eleven  you'll  have  to  wait,  sir.  I 
must  run  and  see  Dick,  first.  I  haven't  said  good 
morning  to  him  yet." 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  181 

Well  Paula  knew  her  husband's  hours.  Scribbled 
secretly  in  the  back  of  the  note-book  that  lay  always 
on  the  reading  stand  by  her  couch  were  hieroglyphic 
notes  that  reminded  her  that  he  had  coffee  at  six- 
thirty;  might  possibly  be  caught  in  bed  with  proof- 
sheets  or  books  till  eight- forty-five,  if  not  out  riding; 
was  inaccessible  between  nine  and  ten,  dictating  cor 
respondence  to  Blake;  was  inaccessible  between  ten 
and  eleven,  conferring  with  managers  and  foremen, 
while  Bonbright,  the  assistant  secretary,  took  down, 
like  any  court  reporter,  every  word  uttered  by  all 
parties  in  the  rapid-fire  interviews. 

At  eleven,  unless  there  were  unexpected  telegrams 
or  business,  she  could  usually  count  on  finding  Dick 
alone  for  a  space,  although  invariably  busy.  Pass 
ing  the  secretaries'  room,  the  click  of  a  typewriter 
informed  her  that  one  obstacle  was  removed.  In 
the  library,  the  sight  of  Mr.  Bonbright  hunting  a 
book  for  Mr.  Manson,  the  Shorthorn  manager,  told 
her  that  Dick's  hour  with  his  head  men  was  over. 

She  pressed  the  button  that  swung  aside  a  section 
of  filled  book-shelves  and  revealed  the  tiny  spiral  of 
steel  steps  that  led  up  to  Dick's  work  room.  At  the 
top,  a  similar  pivoting  section  of  shelves  swung 
obediently  to  her  press  of  button  and  let  her  noise 
lessly  into  his  room.  A  shade  of  vexation  passed 
across  her  face  as  she  recognized  Jeremy  Braxton's 
voice.  She  paused  in  indecision,  neither  seeing  nor 
being  seen. 

"  If  we  flood  we  flood/'  the  mine  superintendent 
was  saying.  "  It  will  cost  a  mint  —  yes,  half  a 
dozen  mints  —  to  pump  out  again.  And  it's  a 
damned  shame  to  drown  the  old  Harvest  that  way." 


1 82  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  But  for  this  last  year  the  books  show  that  we've 
worked  at  a  positive  loss,"  Paula  heard  Dick  take 
up.  "  Every  petty  bandit  from  Huerta  down  to  the 
last  peon  who's  stolen  a  horse  has  gouged  us.  It's 
getting  too  stiff  —  taxes  extraordinary  —  bandits, 
revolutionists,  and  federals.  We  could  survive  it, 
if  only  the  end  were  in  sight;  but  we  have  no  guar 
antee  that  this  disorder  may  not  last  a  dozen  or 
twenty  years." 

"  Just  the  same,  the  old  Harvest  —  think  of  flood 
ing  her !  "  the  superintendent  protested. 

"  And  think  of  Villa,"  Dick  replied,  with  a  sharp 
laugh  the  bitterness  of  which  did  not  escape  Paula. 
"  If  he  wins  he  says  he's  going  to  divide  all  the  land 
among  the  peons.  The  next  logical  step  will  be  the 
mines.  How  much  do  you  think  we've  coughed  up 
to  the  constitutionalists  in  the  past  twelvemonth?  " 

"  Over  a  hundred  and  twenty  thousand,"  Braxton 
answered  promptly.  "  Not  counting  that  fifty 
thousand  cold  bullion  to  Torenas  before  he  retreated. 
He  jumped  his  army  at  Guaymas  and  headed  for 
Europe  with  it  —  I  wrote  you  all  that." 

11  If  we  keep  the  workings  afloat,  Jeremy,  they'll 
go  on  gouging,  gouge  without  end,  Amen.  I  think 
we'd  better  flood.  If  we  can  make  wealth  more 
efficiently  than  those  rapscallions,  let  us  show  them 
that  we  can  destroy  wealth  with  the  same  facility." 

"  That's  what  I  tell  them.  And  they  smile  and 
repeat  that  such  and  such  a  free  will  offering,  under 
exigent  circumstances,  would  be  very  acceptable  to 
the  revolutionary  chiefs  —  meaning  themselves. 
The  big  chiefs  never  finger  one  peso  in  ten  of  it. 
Good  Lord!  I  show  them  what  we've  done. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  183 

Steady  work  for  five  thousand  peons.  Wages  raised 
from  ten  centavos  a  day  to  a  hundred  and  ten.  I 
show  them  peons  —  ten-centavo  men  when  we  took 
them,  and  five-peso  men  when  I  showed  them.  And 
the  same  old  smile  and  the  same  old  itching  palm, 
and  the  same  old  acceptability  of  a  free  will  offering 
from  us  to  the  sacred  cause  of  the  revolution.  By 
God !  Old  Diaz  was  a  robber,  but  he  was  a  decent 
robber.  I  said  to  Arranzo:  '  If  we  shut  down, 
here's  five  thousand  Mexicans  out  of  a  job  - 
what'll  you  do  with  them  ?  '  And  Arranzo  smiled 
and  answered  me  pat.  '  Do  with  them?  '  he  said. 
'  Why,  put  guns  in  their  hands  and  march  'em  down 
to  take  Mexico  City.'  ' 

In  imagination  Paula  could  see  Dick's  disgusted 
shrug  of  shoulders  as  she  heard  him  say: 

"  The  curse  of  it  is.  that  the  stuff  is  there,  and 
that  we're  the  only  fellows  that  can  get  it  out.  The 
Mexicans  can't  do  it.  They  haven't  the  brains.  All 
they've  got  is  the  guns,  and  they're  making  us  shell 
out  more  than  we  make.  There's  only  one  thing  for 
us,  Jeremy.  We'll  forget  profits  for  a  year  or  so, 
lay  off  the  men,  and  just  keep  the  engineer  force  on 
and  the  pumping  going." 

"  I  threw  that  into  Arranzo,"  Jeremy  Braxton's 
voice  boomed.  "And  what  was  his  comeback? 
That  if  we  laid  off  the  peons,  he'd  see  to  it  that  the 
engineers  laid  off,  too,  and  the  mine  could  flood  and 
be  damned  to  us. —  No,  he  didn't  say  that  last. 
He  just  smiled,  but  the  smile  meant  the  same  thing. 
For  two  cents  I'd  a-wrung  his  yellow  neck,  except 
that  there'd  have  been  another  patriot  in  his  boots 
and  in  my  office  next  day  proposing  a  stiffer  gouge. 


1 84  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

So  Arranzo  got  his  '  bit,'  and,  on  top  of  it,  before  he 
went  across  to  join  the  main  bunch  around  Juarez, 
he  let  his  men  run  off  three  hundred  of  our  mules  — 
thirty  thousand  dollars'  worth  of  mule-flesh  right 
there,  after  I'd  sweetened  him,  too.  The  yellow 
skunk!" 

4  Who  is  revolutionary  chief  in  our  diggings  right 
now?  "  Paula  heard  her  husband  ask  with  one  of  his 
abrupt  shifts  that  she  knew  of  old  time  tokened  his 
drawing  together  the  many  threads  of  a  situation 
and  proceeding  to  action. 

"  Raoul  Bena." 

"What's  his  rank?" 

"  Colonel  —  he's  got  about  seventy  ragamuffins." 

"  What  did  he  do  before  he  quit  work?  " 

"  Sheep-herder." 

"  Very  well."  Dick's  utterance  was  quick  and 
sharp.  "  You've  got  to  play-act.  Become  a  pa 
triot.  Hike  back  as  fast  as  God  will  let  you. 
Sweeten  this  Raoul  Bena.  He'll  see  through  your 
play,  or  he's  no  Mexican.  Sweeten  him  and  tell  him 
you'll  make  him  a  general  —  a  second  Villa." 

uLord,  Lord,  yes,  but  how?"  Jeremy  Braxton 
demanded. 

"  By  putting  him  at  the  head  of  an  army  of  five 
thousand.  Lay  off  the  men.  Make  him  make  them 
volunteer.  We're  safe,  because  Huerta  is  doomed. 
Tell  him  you're  a  real  patriot.  Give  each  man  a 
rifle.  We'll  stand  that  for  a  last  gouge,  and  it  will 
prove  you  a  patriot.  Promise  every  man  his  job 
back  when  the  war  is  over.  Let  them  and  Raoul 
Bena  depart  with  your  blessing.  Keep  on  the  pump 
ing  force  only.  And  if  we  cut  out  profits  for  a  year 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  185 

or  so,  at  the  same  time  we  are  cutting  down  losses. 
And  perhaps  we  won't  have  to  flood  old  Harvest 
after  all." 

Paula  smiled  to  herself  at  Dick's  solution  as  she 
stole  back  down  the  spiral  on  her  way  to  the  music 
room.  She  was  depressed,  but  not  by  the  Harvest 
Group  situation.  Ever  since  her  marriage  there  had 
always  been  trouble  in  the  working  of  the  Mexican 
mines  Dick  had  inherited.  Her  depression  was  due 
to  her  having  missed  her  morning  greeting  to  him. 
But  this  depression  vanished  at  meeting  Graham, 
who  had  lingered  with  Ware  at  the  piano  and  who, 
at  her  coming,  was  evidencing  signs  of  departure. 

"  Don't  run  away,"  she  urged.  "  Stay  and  wit 
ness  a  spectacle  of  industry  that  should  nerve  you  up 
to  starting  on  that  book  Dick  has  been  telling  me 
about." 


CHAPTER  XVI 

ON  Dick's  face,  at  lunch,  there  was  no  sign 
of  trouble  over  the  Harvest  Group ;  nor  could 
anybody  have  guessed  that  Jeremy  Braxton's 
visit  had  boded  anything  less  gratifying  than  a  re 
port  of  unfailing  earnings.  Although  Adolph  Weil 
had  gone  on  the  early  morning  train,  which  adver 
tised  that  the  business  which  had  brought  him  had 
been  transacted  with  Dick  at  some  unheard  of  hour, 
Graham  discovered  a  greater  company  than  ever  at 
the  table.  Besides  a  Mrs.  Tully,  who  seemed  a 
stout  and  elderly  society  matron,  and  whom  Graham 
could  not  make  out,  there  were  three  new  men,  of 
whose  identity  he  gleaned  a  little:  a  Mr.  Gulhuss, 
State  Veterinary;  a  Mr.  Deacon,  a  portrait  painter 
of  evident  note  on  the  Coast;  and  a  Captain  Lester, 
then  captain  of  a  Pacific  Mail  liner,  who  had  sailed 
skipper  for  Dick  nearly  twenty  years  before  and 
who  had  helped  Dick  to  his  navigation. 

The  meal  was  at  its  close,  and  the  superintendent 
was  glancing  at  his  watch,  when  Dick  said: 

"  Jeremy,  I  want  to  show  you  what  I've  been  up 
to.  We'll  go  right  now.  You'll  have  time  on  your 
way  to  the  train." 

"  Let  us  all  go,"  Paula  suggested,  "  and  make  a 
party  of  it.  I'm  dying  to  see  it  myself,  Dick's  been 
so  obscure  about  it." 

Sanctioned  by  Dick's  nod,  she  was  ordering  ma 
chines  and  saddle  horses  the  next  moment. 

186 


THE  LITTLE  LADY  187 

"What  is  it?"  Graham  queried,  when  she  had 
finished. 

"  Oh,  one  of  Dick's  stunts.  He's  always  after 
something  new.  This  is  an  invention.  He  swears 
it  will  revolutionize  farming  —  that  it,  small  farm 
ing.  I  have  the  general  idea  of  it,  but  I  haven't 
seen  it  set  up  yet.  It  was  ready  a  week  ago,  but 
there  was  some  delay  about  a  cable  or  something 
concerning  an  adjustment." 

"  There's  billions  in  it  ...  if  it  works,"  Dick 
smiled  over  the  table.  "  Billions  for  the  farmers 
of  the  world,  and  perhaps  a  trifle  of  royalty  for 
me  ...  if  it  works." 

"  But  what  is  it?  "  O'Hay  asked.  "  Music  in  the 
dairy  barns  to  make-  the  cows  give  down  their  milk 
more  placidly?  " 

"  Every  farmer  his  own  plowman  while  sitting 
on  his  front  porch,"  Dick  baffled  back.  !<  In  fact, 
the  labor-eliminating  intermediate  stage  between  soil 
production  and  sheer  laboratory  production  of  food. 
But  wait  till  you  see  it.  Gulhuss,  this  is  where  I  kill 
my  own  business,  if  it  works,  for  it  will  do  away 
with  the  one  horse  of  every  ten-acre  farmer  between 
here  and  Jericho." 

In  ranch  machines  and  on  saddle  animals,  the 
company  was  taken  a  mile  beyond  the  dairy  center, 
where  a  level  field  was  fenced  squarely  off  and  con 
tained,  as  Dick  announced,  just  precisely  ten  acres. 

"  Behold,"  he  said,  "  the  one-man  and  no-horse 
farm  where  the  farmer  sits  on  the  porch.  Please  im 
agine  the  porch." 

In  the  center  of  the  field  was  a  stout  steel  pole,  at 
least  twenty  feet  in  height  and  guyed  very  low. 


1 88  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

From  a  drum  on  top  of  the  pole  a  thin  wire  cable  ran 
to  the  extreme  edge  of  the  field  and  was  attached 
to  the  steering  lever  of  a  small  gasoline  tractor. 
About  the  tractor  two  mechanics  fluttered.  At  com 
mand  from  Dick  they  cranked  the  motor  and  started 
it  on  its  way. 

"  This  is  the  porch,"  Dick  said.  "  Just  imagine 
we're  all  that  future  farmer  sitting  in  the  shade  and 
reading  the  morning  paper  while  the  manless,  horse 
less  plowing  goes  on." 

Alone,  unguided,  the  drum  on  the  head  of  the  pole 
in  the  center  winding  up  the  cable,  the  tractor,  at  the 
circumference  permitted  by  the  cable,  turned  a  single 
furrow  as  it  described  a  circle,  or,  rather,  an  inward 
trending  spiral  about  the  field. 

"  No  horse,  no  driver,  no  plowman,  nothing  but 
the  farmer  to  crank  the  tractor  and  start  it  on  its 
way,"  Dick  exulted,  as  the  uncanny  mechanism  turned 
up  the  brown  soil  and  continued  unguided,  ever 
spiraling  toward  the  field's  center.  "  Plow,  harrow, 
roll,  seed,  fertilize,  cultivate,  harvest  —  all  from  the 
front  porch.  And  where  the  farmer  can  buy  juice 
from  a  power  company,  all  he,  or  his  wife,  will  have 
to  do  is  press  the  button,  and  he  to  his  newspaper, 
and  she  to  her  pie-crust." 

"  All  you  need,  now,  to  make  it  absolutely  per 
fect,"  Graham  praised,  "  is  to  square  the  circle." 

"  Yes,"  Mr.  Gulhuss  agreed.  "  As  it  is,  a  circle 
in  a  square  field  loses  some  acreage." 

Graham's  face  advertised  a  mental  arithmetic 
trance  for  a  minute,  when  he  announced :  "  Loses, 
roughly,  three  acres  out  of  every  ten." 

"  Sure,"  Dick  concurred.     "  But  the  farmer  has 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  189 

to  have  his  front  porch  somewhere  on  his  ten  acres. 
And  the  front  porch  represents  the  house,  the  barn, 
the  chicken  yard  and  the  various  outbuildings. 
Very  well.  Let  him  get  tradition  out  of  his  mind, 
and,  instead  of  building  these  things  in  the  center 
of  his  ten  acres,  let  him  build  them  on  the  three  acres 
of  fringe.  And  let  him  plant  his  fruit  and  shade 
trees  and  berry  bushes  on  the  fringe.  When  you 
come  to  consider  it,  the  traditionary  method  of  erect 
ing  the  buildings  in  the  center  of  a  rectangular  ten 
acres  compels  him  to  plow  around  the  center  in 
broken  rectangles.'7 

Gulhuss  nodded  enthusiastically.  "  Sure.  And 
there's  always  the  roadway  from  the  center  out  to 
the  county  road  or  right  of  way.  That  breaks  the 
efficiency  of  his  plowing.  Break  ten  acres  into  the 
consequent  smaller  rectangles,  and  it's  expensive  cul 
tivation." 

"  Wish  navigation  was  as  automatic,"  was  Captain 
Lester's  contribution. 

"  Or  portrait  painting,"  laughed  Rita  Wainwright 
with  a  significant  glance  at  Mr.  Deacon. 

"  Or  musical  criticism,"  Lute  remarked,  with  no 
glance  at  all,  but  with  a  pointedness  of  present  com 
pany  that  brought  from  O'Hay : 

"  Or  just  being  a  charming  young  woman." 

"What  price  for  the  outfit?"  Jeremy  Braxton 
asked. 

"  Right  now,  we  could  manufacture  and  lay  down, 
at  a  proper  profit,  for  five  hundred.  If  the  thing 
came  into  general  use,  with  up  to  date,  large-scale 
factory  methods,  three  hundred.  But  say  five  hun 
dred.  And  write  off  fifteen  per  cent,  for  interest 


1 90  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

and  constant,  it  would  cost  the  farmer  seventy  dol 
lars  a  year.  What  ten-acre  farmer,  on  two-hun 
dred-dollar  land,  who  keeps  books,  can  keep  a  horse 
for  seventy  dollars  a  year?  And  on  top  of  that, 
it  would  save  him,  in  labor,  personal  or  hired,  at 
the  abjectest  minimum,  two  hundred  dollars  a  year." 

"  But  what  guides  it?  "  Rita  asked. 

"  The  drum  on  the  post.  The  drum  is  graduated 
for  the  complete  radius  —  which  took  some  tall 
figuring,  I  assure  you  —  and  the  cable,  winding 
around  the  drum  and  shortening,  draws  the  tractor 
in  toward  the  center." 

'  There  are  lots  of  objections  to  its  general  in 
troduction,  even  among  small  farmers,"  Gulhuss 
said. 

Dick  nodded  affirmation. 

"  Sure,"  he  replied.  "  I  have  over  forty  noted 
down  and  classified.  And  I've  as  many  more  for  the 
machine  itself.  If  the  thing  is  a  success,  it  will  take 
a  long  time  to  perfect  it  and  introduce  it." 

Graham  found  himself  divided  between  watching 
the  circling  tractor  and  casting  glances  at  the  picture 
Paula  Forrest  was  on  her  mount.  It  was  her  first 
day  on  The  Fawn,  which  was  the  Palomina  mare 
Hennessy  had  trained  for  her.  Graham  smiled  with 
secret  approval  of  her  femininity;  for  Paula,  whether 
she  had  designed  her  habit  for  the  mare,  or  had 
selected  one  most  peculiarly  appropriate,  had 
achieved  a  triumph. 

In  place  of  a  riding  coat,  for  the  afternoon  was 
warm,  she  wore  a  tan  linen  blouse  with  white  turn 
back  collar.  A  short  skirt,  made  like  the  lower 
part  of  a  riding  coat,  reached  the  knees,  and  from 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  191 

knees  to  entrancing  little  bespurred  champagne  boots 
tight  riding  trousers  showed.  Skirt  and  trousers 
were  of  fawn-colored  silk  corduroy.  Soft  white 
gauntlets  on  her  hands  matched  with  the  collar  in 
the  one  emphasis  of  color.  Her  head  was  bare,  the 
hair  done  tight  and  low  around  her  ears  and  nape 
of  neck. 

u  I  don't  see  how  you  can  keep  such  a  skin  and 
expose  yourself  to  the  sun  this  way,"  Graham  ven 
tured,  in  mild  criticism. 

"  I  don't,"  she  smiled  with  a  dazzle  of  white  teeth. 

'  That  is,  I  don't  expose  my  face  this  way  more  than 

a  few  times  a  year.     I'd  like  to,  because  I  love  the 

sun-gold  burn  in  my  hair;  but  I  don't  dare  a  thorough 

tanning." 

The  mare  frisked,  and  a  breeze  of  air  blew  back 
a  flap  of  skirt,  showing  an  articulate  knee  where  the 
trouser  leg  narrowed  tightly  over  it.  Again  Graham 
visioned  the  white  round  of  knee  pressed  into  the 
round  muscles  of  the  swimming  Mountain  Lad,  as 
he  noted  the  firm  knee-grip  on  her  pigskin  English 
saddle,  quite  new  and  fawn-colored  to  match  costume 
and  horse. 

When  the  magneto  on  the  tractor  went  wrong, 
and  the  mechanics  busied  themselves  with  it  in  the 
midst  of  the  partly  plowed  field,  the  company,  under 
Paula's  guidance,  leaving  Dick  behind  with  his  in 
vention,  resolved  itself  into  a  pilgrimage  among  the 
brood-centers  on  the  way  to  the  swimming  tank. 
Mr.  Crellin,  the  hog-manager,  showed  them  Lady 
Isleton,  who,  with  her  prodigious,  fat,  recent 
progeny  of  eleven,  won  various  naive  encomiums, 
while  Mr.  Crellin  warmly  proclaimed  at  least  four 


1 92  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

times,  "  And  not  a  runt,  not  a  runt,  in  the  bunch." 
Other  glorious  brood-sows,  of  Berkshire,  Duroc- 
Jersey,  and  O.  I.  C.  blood,  they  saw  till  they  were 
wearied,  and  new-born  kids  and  lambs,  and  rotund 
does  and  ewes.  From  center  to  center,  Paula  kept 
the  telephones  warning  ahead  of  the  party's  coming, 
so  that  Mr.  Manson  waited  to  exhibit  the  great  King 
Polo,  and  his  broad-backed  Shorthorn  harem,  and 
the  Shorthorn  harems  of  bulls  that  were  only  little 
less  than  King  Polo  in  magnificence  and  record;  and 
Parkman,  the  Jersey  manager,  was  on  hand,  with 
staffed  assistants,  to  parade  Sensational  Drake, 
Golden  Jolly,  Fontaine  Royal,  Oxford  Master,  and 
Karnak's  Fairy  Boy  —  blue  ribbon  bulls,  all,  and 
founders  and  scions  of  noble  houses  of  butter-fat  re 
nown,  and  Rosaire  Queen,  Standby's  Dam,  Golden 
Jolly's  Lass,  Olga's  Pride,  and  Gertie  of  Maitlands 
—  equally  blue-ribboned  and  blue-blooded  Jersey 
matrons  in  the  royal  realm  of  butter-fat;  and  Mr. 
Mendenhall,  who  had  charge  of  the  Shires,  proudly 
exhibited  a  string  of  mighty  stallions,  led  by  the 
mighty  Mountain  Lad,  and  a  longer  string  of 
matrons,  headed  by  the  Fotherington  Princess  of  the 
silver  whinny.  Even  old  Alden  Bessie,  the  Prin 
cess's  dam,  retired  to  but  part-day's  work,  he  sent 
for  that  they  might  render  due  honor  to  so  notable 
a  dam. 

As  four  o'clock  approached,  Donald  Ware,  not 
keen  on  swimming,  returned  in  one  of  the  machines 
to  the  Big  House,  and  Mr.  Gulhuss  remained  to  dis 
cuss  Shires  with  Mr.  Mendenhall.  Dick  was  at  the 
tank  when  the  party  arrived,  and  the  girls  were  im 
mediately  insistent  for  the  new  song. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  193 

"  It  isn't  exactly  a  new  song,"  Dick  explained,  his 
gray  eyes  twinkling  roguery,  "  and  it's  not  my  song. 
It  was  sung  in  Japan  before  I  was  born,  and,  I  doubt 
not,  before  Columbus  discovered  America.  Also,  it 
is  a  duet  —  a  competitive  duet  with  forfeit  penalties 
attached.  Paula  will  have  to  sing  it  with  me.—  I'll 
teach  you.  Sit  down  there,  that's  right.—  Now 
all  the  rest  of  you  gather  around  and  sit  down." 

Still  in  her  riding  habit,  Paula  sat  down  on  the 
concrete,  facing  her  husband,  in  the  center  of  the 
sitting  audience.  Under  his  direction,  timing  her 
movements  to  his,  she  slapped  her  hands  on  her 
knees,  slapped  her  palms  together,  and  slapped  her 
palms  against  his  palms  much  in  the  fashion  of  the 
nursery  game  of  "  Bean  Porridge  Hot."  Then  he 
sang  the  song,  which  was  short  and  which  she  quickly 
picked  up,  singing  it  with  him  and  clapping  the  ac 
cent.  While  the  air  of  it  was  orientally  catchy,  it 
was  chanted  slowly,  almost  monotonously,  but  it  was 
quickly  provocative  of  excitement  to  the  spectators: 

"  Jong-Keena,  Jong-Keena, 
Jong-Jong,  Keena-Keena, 
Yo-ko-ham-a,,  Nag-a-sak-i, 
Kobe-mar-o  —  hoy!  !  !  " 

The  last  syllable,  hoy,  was  uttered  suddenly,  ex 
plosively,  and  an  octave  and  more  higher  than  the 
pitch  of  the  melody.  At  the  same  moment  that  it 
was  uttered,  Paula's  and  Dick's  hands  were  abruptly 
shot  toward  each  other's,  either  clenched  or  open. 
The  point  of  the  game  was  that  Paula's  hands, 
open  or  closed,  at  the  instant  of  uttering  hoy, 
should  match  Dick's.  Thus,  the  first  time,  she  did 


194  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

match  him,  both  his  and  her  hands  being  closed, 
whereupon  he  took  off  his  hat  and  tossed  it  into 
Lute's  lap. 

"  My  forfeit,"  he  explained.  "  Come  on,  Paul, 
again."  And  again  they  sang  and  clapped: 

rt  Jong-Keena,  Jong-Keena, 
Jong-Jong,  Keena-Keena, 
Yo-ko-ham-a,  Nag-a-sak-i, 
Kobe-mar-o  —  hoy!  !  !  " 

This  time,  with  the  hoy,  her  hands  were  closed  and 
his  were  open. 

"  Forfeit !  —  forfeit !  "  the  girls  cried. 

She  looked  her  costume  over  with  alarm,  asking, 
"What  can  I  give?" 

"  A  hair  pin,"  Dick  advised;  and  one  of  her  tur- 
tleshell  hair  pins  joined  his  hat  in  Lute's  lap. 

"  Bother  it !  "  she  exclaimed,  when  the  last  of  her 
hair  pins  had  gone  the  same  way,  she  having  failed 
seven  times  to  Dick's  once.  "  I  can't  see  why  I 
should  be  so  slow  and  stupid.  Besides,  Dick,  you're 
too  clever.  I  never  could  out-guess  you  or  out-an 
ticipate  you." 

Again  they  sang  the  song.  She  lost,  and,  to  Mrs. 
Tully's  shocked  "  Paula !  "  she  forfeited  a  spur  and 
threatened  a  boot  when  the  remaining  spur  should  be 
gone.  A  winning  streak  of  three  compelled  Dick 
to  give  up  his  wrist  watch  and  both  spurs.  Then 
she  lost  her  wrist  watch  and  the  remaining  spur. 

"  Jong-Keena,  Jong-Keena,"  they  began  again, 
while  Mrs.  Tully  remonstrated,  "  Now,  Paula,  you 
simply  must  stop  this. —  Dick,  you  ought  to  be 
ashamed  of  yourself." 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  195 

But  Dick,  emitting  a  triumphant  "Hoy!"  won, 
and  joined  in  the  laughter  as  Paula  took  off  one  of 
her  little  champagne  boots  and  added  it  to  the  heap 
in  Lute's  lap. 

"  It's  all  right,  Aunt  Martha,"  Paula  assured  Mrs. 
Tully.  "  Mr.  Ware's  not  here,  and  he's  the  only 
one  who  would  be  shocked. —  Come  on,  Dick. 
You  can't  win  every  time." 

"  Jong-Keena,  Jong-Keena,"  she  chanted  on  with 
her  husband. 

The  repetition,  at  first  slow,  had  accelerated 
steadily,  so  that  now  they  fairly  rippled  through  with 
it,  while  their  slapping,  striking  palms  made  a  con 
tinuous  patter.  The  exercise  and  excitement  had 
added  to  the  sun's  action  on  her  skin,  so  that  her 
laughing  face  was  all  a  rosy  glow. 

Evan  Graham,  a  silent  spectator,  was  aware  of 
hurt  and  indignity.  He  knew  the  "  Jong-Keena  "  of 
old  time  from  the  geishas  of  the  tea  houses  of  Nip 
pon,  and,  despite  the  unconventionally  that  ruled 
the  Forrests  and  the  Big  House,  he  experienced 
shock  in  that  Paula  should  take  part  in  such  a  game. 
It  did  not  enter  his  head  at  the  moment  that  he 
would  have  been  merely  curious  to  see  how  far  the 
madness  would  go  had  the  player  been  Lute,  or 
Ernestine,  or  Rita.  Not  till  afterward  did  he  realize 
that  his  concern  and  sense  of  outrage  were  due  to  the 
fact  that  the  player  was  Paula,  and  that,  therefore, 
she  was  bulking  bigger  in  his  imagination  than  he 
was  conscious  of.  What  he  was  conscious  of  at  the 
moment  was  that  he  was  growing  angry  and  that  he 
had  deliberately  to  check  himself  from  protesting. 

By  this  time   Dick's  cigarette  case  and  matches 


196  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

and  Paula's  second  boot,  belt,  skirt-pin,  and  wedding 
ring  had  joined  the  mound  of  forfeits.  Mrs.  Tully, 
her  face  set  in  stoic  resignation,  was  silent. 

"  Jong-Keena,  Jong-Keena,"  Paula  laughed  and 
sang  on,  and  Graham  heard  Ernestine  laugh  to  Bert, 
"  I  don't  see  what  she  can  spare  next." 

;*  Well,  you  know  her,"  he  heard  Bert  answer. 
"  She's  game  once  she  gets  started,  and  it  certainly 
looks  like  she's  started." 

"Hoy!"  Paula  and  Dick  cried  simultaneously,  as 
they  thrust  out  their  hands. 

But  Dick's  were  closed,  and  hers  were  open. 
Graham  watched  her  vainly  quest  her  person  for  the 
consequent  forfeit. 

"  Come  on,  Lady  Godiva,"  Dick  commanded. 
'  You  hae  sung,  you  hae  danced;  now  pay  the  piper." 

;<  Was  the  man  a  fool?  "  was  Graham's  thought. 
"  And  a  man  with  a  wife  like  that." 

"  Well,"  Paula  sighed,  her  fingers  playing  with 
the  fastenings  of  her  blouse,  "  if  I  must,  I  must." 

Raging  inwardly,  Graham  averted  his  gaze,  and 
kept  it  averted.  There  was  a  pause,  in  which  he 
knew  everybody  must  be  hanging  on  what  she  would 
do  next.  Then  came  a  giggle  from  Ernestine,  a 
burst  of  laughter  from  all,  and,  "  A  frame-up !  " 
from  Bert,  that  overcame  Graham's  resoluteness. 
He  looked  quickly.  The  Little  Lady's  blouse  was 
off,  and,  from  the  waist  up,  she  appeared  in  her  swim 
ming  suit.  It  was  evident  that  she  had  dressed  over 
it  for  the  ride. 

"  Come  on,  Lute  —  you  next,"  Dick  was  chal 
lenging. 

But  Lute,  not  similarly  prepared  for  Jong-Keena, 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  197 

blushingly  led  the  retreat  of  the  girls  to  the  dress 
ing  rooms. 

Graham  watched  Paula  poise  at  the  forty-foot  top 
of  the  diving  scaffold  and  swan-dive  beautifully  into 
the  tank;  heard  Bert's  admiring  "  Oh,  you  Annette 
Kellerman!  "  and,  still  chagrined  by  the  trick  that 
had  threatened  to  outrage  him,  fell  to  wondering 
about  the  wonder  woman,  the  Little  Lady  of  the 
Big  House,  and  how  she  had  happened  so  wonder 
fully  to  be.  As  he  fetched  down  the  length  of  tank, 
under  water,  moving  with  leisurely  strokes  and  with 
open  eyes  watching  the  shoaling  bottom,  it  came  to 
him  that  he  did  not  know  anything  about  her.  She 
was  Dick  Forrest's  wife.  That  was  all  he  knew. 
How  she  had  been  born,  how  she  had  lived,  how  and 
where  her  past  had  been  —  of  all  this  he  knew  noth 
ing. 

Ernestine  had  told  him  that  Lute  and  she  were  half 
sisters  of  Paula.  That  was  one  bit  of  data,  at  any 
rate.  (Warned  by  the  increasing  brightness  of  the 
bottom  that  he  had  nearly  reached  the  end  of  the 
tank,  and  recognizing  Dick's  and  Bert's  legs  inter 
twined  in  what  must  be  a  wrestling  bout,  Graham 
turned  about,  still  under  water,  and  swam  back  a 
score  or  so  of  feet.)  There  was  that  Mrs.  Tully 
whom  Paula  had  addressed  as  Aunt  Martha.  Was 
she  truly  an  aunt?  Or  was  she  a  courtesy  Aunt 
through  sisterhood  with  the  mother  of  Lute  and 
Ernestine  ? 

He  broke  surface,  was  hailed  by  the  others  to 
join  in  bull-in-the-ring;  in  which  strenuous  sport,  for 
the  next  half  hour,  he  was  compelled  more  than  once 
to  marvel  at  the  litheness  and  agility,  as  well  as 


198  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

strategy,  of  Paula  in  her  successful  efforts  at  escap 
ing  through  the  ring.  Concluding  the  game  through 
weariness,  breathing  hard,  the  entire  party  raced  the 
length  of  the  tank  and  crawled  out  to  rest  in  the 
sunshine  in  a  circle  about  Mrs,  Tully. 

Soon  there  was  more  fun  afoot,  and  Paula  was 
contending  impossible  things  with  Mrs.  Tully. 

"  Now,  Aunt  Martha,  just  because  you  never 
learned  to  swim  is  no  reason  for  you  to  take  such  a 
position.  I  am  a  real  swimmer,  and  I  tell  you  I  can 
dive  right  into  the  tank  here,  and  stay  under  for  ten 
minutes." 

"  Nonsense,  child,"  Mrs.  Tully  beamed.  "  Your 
father,  when  he  was  young,  a  great  deal  younger  than 
you,  my  dear,  could  stay  under  water  longer  than  any 
other  man;  and  his  record,  as  I  know,  was  three 
minutes  and  forty  seconds,  as  I  very  well  know,  for 
I  held  the  watch  myself  and  kept  the  time  when  he 
won  against  Harry  Selby  on  a  wager." 

"  Oh,  I  know  my  father  was  some  man  in  his 
time,"  Paula  swaggered;  "but  times  have  changed. 
If  I  had  the  old  dear  here  right  now,  in  all  his  youth 
ful  excellence,  I'd  drown  him  if  he  tried  to  stay  under 
water  with  me.  Ten  minutes  ?  Of  course  I  can  do 
ten  minutes.  And  I  will.  You  hold  the  watch, 
Aunt  Martha,  and  time  me.  Why,  it's  as  easy 
as—" 

"  Shooting  fish  in  a  bucket,"  Dick  completed  for 
her. 

Paula  climbed  to  the  platform  above  the  spring 
board. 

*  Time  me  when  I'm  in  the  air,"  she  said. 

"  Make  your  turn  and  a  half,"  Dick  called. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  199 

She  nodded,  smiled,  and  simulated  a  prodigious 
effort  at  filling  her  lungs  to  their  utmost  capacity. 
Graham  watched  enchanted.  A  diver  himself,  he 
had  rarely  seen  the  turn  and  a  half  attempted  by 
women  other  than  professionals.  Her  wet  suit  of 
light  blue  and  green  silk  clung  closely  to  her,  show 
ing  the  lines  of  her  justly  proportioned  body.  With 
what  appeared  to  be  an  agonized  gulp  for  the  last 
cubic  inch  of  air  her  lungs  could  contain,  she  sprang 
up,  out,  and  down,  her  body  vertical  and  stiff,  her 
legs  straight,  her  feet  close  together  as  they  impacted 
on  the  springboard  end.  Flung  into  the  air  by  the 
board,  she  doubled  her  body  into  a  ball,  made  a  com 
plete  revolution,  then  straightened  out  in  perfect 
diver's  form,  and  in  a  perfect  dive,  with  scarcely  a 
ripple,  entered  the  water. 

"  A  Toledo  blade  would  have  made  more  splash," 
was  Graham's  verdict. 

"  If  only  I  could  dive  like  that,"  Ernestine 
breathed  her  admiration.  "  But  I  never  shall. 
Dick  says  diving  is  a  matter  of  timing,  and  that's 
why  Paula  does  it  so  terribly  well.  She's  got  the 
sense  of  time  — " 

"  And  of  abandon,"  Graham  added. 

"  Of  willed  abandon,"  Dick  qualified. 

"  Of  relaxation  by  effort,"  Graham  agreed. 
"  I've  never  seen  a  professional  do  so  perfect  a  turn 
and  a  half." 

"  And  I'm  prouder  of  it  than  she  is,"  Dick  pro 
claimed.  "  You  see,  I  taught  her,  though  I  confess 
it  was  an  easy  task.  She  coordinates  almost  effort 
lessly.  And  that,  along  with  her  will  and  sense  of 
time  —  why  her  first  attempt  was  better  than  fair." 


200  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  Paula  is  a  remarkable  woman,"  Mrs.  Tully  said 
proudly,  her  eyes  fluttering  between  the  second  hand 
of  the  watch  and  the  unbroken  surface  of  the  pool. 
'  Women  never  swim  so  well  as  men.  But  she 
does. —  Three  minutes  and  forty  seconds !  She's 
beaten  her  father!  " 

u  But  she  won't  stay  under  any  five  minutes,  much 
less  ten,"  Dick  solemnly  stated.  "  She'll  burst  her 
lungs  first." 

At  four  minutes,  Mrs.  Tully  began  to  show  excite 
ment  and  to  look  anxiously  from  face  to  face.  Cap 
tain  Lester,  not  in  the  secret,  scrambled  to  his  feet 
with  an  oath  and  dived  into  the  tank. 

"  Something  has  happened,"  Mrs.  Tully  said  with 
controlled  quietness.  "  She  hurt  herself  on  that 
dive.  Go  in  after  her,  you  men." 

But  Graham  and  Bert  and  Dick,  meeting  under 
water,  gleefully  grinned  and  squeezed  hands.  Dick 
made  signs  for  them  to  follow,  and  led  the  way 
through  the  dark-shadowed  water  into  the  crypt, 
where,  treading  water,  they  joined  Paula  in  subdued 
whisperings  and  gigglings. 

"  Just  came  to  make  sure  you  were  all  right,"  Dick 
explained.  "  And  now  we've  got  to  beat  it. —  You 
first,  Bert.  I'll  follow  Evan." 

And,  one  by  one,  they  went  down  through  the  dark 
water  and  came  up  on  the  surface  of  the  pool.  By 
this  time  Mrs.  Tully  was  on  her  feet  and  standing 
by  the  edge  of  the  tank. 

"  If  I  thought  this  was  one  of  your  tricks,  Dick 
Forrest,"  she  began. 

But    Dick,    paying   no    attention,    acting   preter- 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  201 

naturally  calmly,  was  directing  the  men  loudly 
enough  for  her  to  hear. 

"  We've  got  to  make  this  systematic,  fellows. 
You,  Bert,  and  you,  Evan,  join  with  me.  We  start 
at  this  end,  five  feet  apart,  and  search  the  bottom 
across.  Then  move  along  and  repeat  it  back." 

"  Don't  exert  yourselves,  gentlemen,"  Mrs.  Tully 
called,  beginning  to  laugh.  "  As  for  you,  Dick,  you 
come  right  out.  I  want  to  box  your  ears." 

"  Take  care  of  her,  you  girls,"  Dick  shouted. 
"  She's  got  hysterics." 

"  I  haven't,  but  I  will  have,"  she  laughed. 

"  But  damn  it  all,  madam,  this  is  no  laughing  mat 
ter!  "  Captain  Lester  spluttered  breathlessly,  as  he 
prepared  for  another  trip  to  explore  the  bottom. 

"  Are  you  on,  Aunt  Martha,  really  and  truly  on?  " 
Dick  asked,  after  the  valiant  mariner  had  gone 
down. 

Mrs.  Tully  nodded.  "  But  keep  it  up,  Dick, 
youVe  got  one  dupe.  Elsie  Coghlan's  mother  told 
me  about  it  in  Honolulu  last  year." 

Not  until  eleven  minutes  had  elapsed  did  the  smil 
ing  face  of  Paula  break  the  surface.  Simulating  ex 
haustion,  she  slowly  crawled  out  and  sank  down 
1  panting  near  her  aunt.  Captain  Lester,  really  ex 
hausted  by  his  strenuous  exertions  at  rescue,  studied 
Paula  keenly,  then  marched  to  the  nearest  pillar 
and  meekly  bumped  his  head  three  times  against  the 
concrete. 

"  I'm  afraid  I  didn't  stay  down  ten  minutes," 
Paula  said.  u  But  I  wasn't  much  under  that,  was  I, 
Aunt  Martha?" 


202  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  You  weren't  much  under  at  all,"  Mrs.  Tully  re 
plied,  "  if  it's  my  opinion  you  were  asking.  I'm  sur 
prised  that  you  are  even  wet —  There,  there, 
breathe  naturally,  child.  The  play-acting  is  unneces 
sary.  I  remember,  when  I  was  a  young  girl,  trav 
eling  in  India,  there  was  a  school  of  fakirs  who 
leaped  into  deep  wells  and  stayed  down  much  longer 
than  you,  child,  much  longer  indeed." 

"  You  knew !  "  Paula  charged. 

"  But  you  didn't  know  I  did,"  her  Aunt  retorted. 
"  And  therefore  your  conduct  was  criminal.  When 
you  consider  a  woman  of  my  age,  with  my  heart  — " 

"  And  with  your  blessed,  brass-tack  head,"  Paula 
cried. 

"  For  two  apples  I'd  box  your  ears." 

"  And  for  one  apple  I'd  hug  you,  wet  as  I  am," 
Paula  laughed  back.  "  Anyway,  we  did  fool  Cap 
tain  Lester. —  Didn't  we,  Captain?" 

"  Don't  speak  to  me,"  that  doughty  mariner  mut 
tered  darkly.  "  I'm  busy  with  myself,  meditating 
what  form  my  vengeance  shall  take. —  As  for  you, 
Mr.  Dick  Forrest,  I'm  divided  between  blowing 
up  your  dairy,  or  hamstringing  Mountain  Lad.| 
Maybe  I'll  do  both.  In  the  meantime  I  am  going 
out  to  kick  that  mare  you  ride." 

Dick  on  The  Outlaw,  and  Paula  on  The  Fawn, 
rode  back  side  by  side  to  the  Big  House. 

"  How  do  you  like  Graham?  "  he  asked. 

"  Splendid,"  was  her  reply.  "  He's  your  type, 
Dick.  He's  universal,  like  you,  and  he's  got  the 
same  world-marks  branded  on  him  —  the  Seven 
Seas,  the  books,  and  all  the  rest.  He's  an  artist, 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  203 

too,  and  pretty  well  all-around.  And  he's  good  fun. 
Have  you  noticed  his  smile?  It's  irresistible.  It 
makes  one  want  to  smile  with  him." 

"  And  he's  got  his  serious  scars,  as  well,"  Dick 
nodded  concurrence. 

"  Yes  —  right  in  the  corners  of  the  eyes,  just  after 
he  has  smiled,  you'll  see  them  come.  They're  not 
tired  marks  exactly,  but  rather  the  old  eternal  ques 
tions:  Why?  What  for?  What's  it  worth? 
%  What's  it  all  about?" 

And  bringing  up  the  rear  of  the  cavalcade,  Ernes 
tine  and  Graham  talked. 

u  Dick's  deep,"  she  was  saying.  '  You  don't 
know  him  any  too  well.  He's  dreadfully  deep.  I 
know  him  a  little.  Paula  knows  him  a  lot.  But 
very  few  others  ever  get  under  the  surface  of  him. 
He's  a  real  philosopher,  and  he  has  the  control  of  a 
stoic  or  an  Englishman,  and  he  can  play-act  to  fool 
the  world." 

At  the  long  hitching  rails  under  the  oaks,  where 
the  dismounting  party  gathered,  Paula  was  in  gales 
of  laughter. 

"  Go  on,  go  on,"  she  urged  Dick,  "  more,  more." 

"  She's  been  accusing  me  of  exhausting  my  vocabu 
lary  in  naming  the  house-boys  by  my  system,"  he  ex 
plained. 

"  And  he's  given  me  at  least  forty  more  names  in 
a  minute  and  a  half. —  Go  on,  Dick,  more." 

"  Then,"  he  said,  striking  a  chant,  "  we  can  have 
Oh  Sin  and  Oh  Pshaw,  Oh  Sing  and  Oh  Song,  Oh 
Sung  and  Oh  Sang,  Oh  Last  and  Oh  Least,  Oh  Ping 


204  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

and  Oh  Pong,  Oh  Some,  Oh  More,  and  Oh  Most, 
Oh  Naught  and  Oh  Nit  .  .  ." 

And  Dick  jingled  away  into  the  house  still  chant 
ing  his  extemporized  directory. 


CHAPTER  XVII 

A  WEEK  of  dissatisfaction  and  restlessness  en 
sued  for  Graham.  Torn  between  belief  that 
his  business  was  to  leave  the  Big  House  on 
the  first  train,  and  desire  to  see,  and  see  more  of 
Paula,  to  be  with  her,  and  to  be  more  with  her  — 
he  succeeded  in  neither  leaving  nor  in  seeing  as  much 
of  her  as  during  the  first  days  of  his  visit. 

At  first,  and  for  the  five  days  that  he  lingered, 
the  young  violinist  monopolized  nearly  her  entire 
time  of  visibility.  Often  Graham  strayed  into  the 
music  room,  and,  quite  neglected  by  the  pair,  sat 
for  moody  half-hours  listening  to  their  u  work." 
They  were  oblivious  of  his  presence,  either  flushed 
and  absorbed  with  the  passion  of  their  music,  or  wip 
ing  their  foreheads  and  chatting  and  laughing  com- 
panionably  in  pauses  to  rest.  That  the  young 
musician  loved  her  with  an  ardency  that  was  almost 
painful,  was  patent  to  Graham;  but  what  hurt  him 
was  the  abandon  of  devotion  with  which  she  some 
times  looked  at  Ware  after  he  had  done  something 
exceptionally  fine.  In  vain  Graham  tried  to  tell 
himself  that  all  this  was  mental  on  her  part  —  purely 
delighted  appreciation  of  the  other's  artistry.  Nev 
ertheless,  being  man,  it  hurt,  and  continued  to  hurt, 
until  he  could  no  longer  suffer  himself  to  remain. 

Once,  chancing  into  the  room  at  the  end  of  a 
205 


206  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

Schumann  song  and  just  after  Ware  had  departed, 
Graham  found  Paula  still  seated  at  the  piano,  an 
expression  of  rapt  dreaming  on  her  face.  She  re 
garded  him  almost  unrecognizingly,  gathered  her 
self  mechanically  together,  uttered  an  absent-minded 
commonplace  or  so,  and  left  the  room.  Despite  his 
vexation  and  hurt,  Graham  tried  to  think  it  mere  ar 
tist-dreaming  on  her  part,  a  listening  to  the  echo  of 
the  just-played  music  in  her  soul.  But  women  were 
curious  creatures,  he  could  not  help  moralizing,  and 
were  prone  to  lose  their  hearts  most  strangely  and 
inconsequentially.  Might  it  not  be  that  by  his  very 
music  this  youngster  of  a  man  was  charming  the 
woman  of  her? 

With  the  departure  of  Ware,  Paula  Forrest  re 
tired  almost  completely  into  her  private  wing  behind 
the  door  without  a  knob.  Nor  did  this  seem  un 
usual,  Graham  gleaned  from  the  household. 

"  Paula  is  a  woman  who  finds  herself  very  good 
company,"  Ernestine  explained,  "  and  she  often  goes 
in  for  periods  of  aloneness,  when  Dick  is  the  only 
person  who  sees  her." 

"  Which  is  not  flattering  to  the  rest  of  the  com 
pany,"  Graham  smiled. 

"  Which  makes  her  such  good  company  whenever 
she  is  in  company,"  Ernestine  retorted. 

The  driftage  through  the  Big  House  was  decreas 
ing.  A  few  guests,  on  business  or  friendship,  con 
tinued  to  come,  but  more  departed.  Under  Oh  Joy 
and  his  Chinese  staff  the  Big  House  ran  so  friction- 
lessly  and  so  perfectly,  that  entertainment  of  guests 
seemed  little  part  of  the  host's  duties.  The  guests 
largely  entertained  themselves  and  one  another. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  207 

Dick  rarely  appeared,  even  for  a  moment,  until 
lunch,  and  Paula,  now  carrying  out  her  seclusion  pro 
gram,  never  appeared  before  dinner. 

"  Rest  cure,"  Dick  laughed  one  noon,  and  chal 
lenged  Graham  to  a  tournament  with  boxing  gloves, 
single-sticks,  and  foils. 

"  And  now's  the  time,"  he  told  Graham,  as  they 
breathed  between  bouts,  "  for  you  to  tackle  your 
book.  I'm  only  one  of  the  many  who  are  looking 
forward  to  reading  it,  and  I'm  looking  forward 
hard.  Got  a  letter  from  Havely  yesterday  —  he 
mentioned  it,  and  wondered  how  far  along  you 


were." 


So  Graham,  in  his  tower  room,  arranged  his  notes 
and  photographs,  schemed  out  the  work,  and  plunged 
into  the  opening  chapters.  So  immersed  did  he  be 
come  that  his  nascent  interest  in  Paula  might  have 
languished,  had  it  not  been  for  meeting  her  each 
evening  at  dinner.  Then,  too,  until  Ernestine  and 
Lute  left  for  Santa  Barbara,  there  were  afternoon 
swims  and  rides  and  motor  trips  to  the  pastures  of 
the  Miramar  Hills  and  the  upland  ranges  of  the 
Anselmo  Mountains.  Other  trips  they  made,  some 
times  accompanied  by  Dick,  to  his  great  dredgers 
working  in  the  Sacramento  basin,  or  his  dam-build 
ing  on  the  Little  Coyote  and  Los  Cuatos  creeks,  or 
to  his  five-thousand-acre  colony  of  twenty-acre 
farmers,  where  he  was  trying  to  enable  two  hun 
dred  and  fifty  heads  of  families,  along  with  their 
families,  to  make  good  on  the  soil. 

That  Paula  sometimes  went  for  long  solitary  rides, 
Graham  knew,  and,  once,  he  caught  her  dismounting 
from  the  Fawn  at  the  hitching  rails. 


208  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  Don't  you  think  you  are  spoiling  that  mare  for 
riding  in  company?  "  he  twitted. 

Paula  laughed  and  shook  her  head. 

;t  Well,  then,"  he  asserted  stoutly,  "  I'm  spoiling 
for  a  ride  with  you." 

"There's  Lute,  and  Ernestine,  and  Bert,  and  all 
the  rest." 

"  This  is  new  country,"  he  contended.  "  And  one 
learns  country  through  the  people  who  know  it. 
I've  seen  it  through  the  eyes  of  Lute,  and  Ernestine 
and  all  the  rest;  but  there  is  a  lot  I  haven't  seen  and 
wjikh  I  can  see  only  through  your  eyes." 

"  A  pleasant  theory,"  she  evaded.  "A  —  a  sort 
bf  landscape  vampirism." 

But  without  the  ill  effects  of  vampirism,"  he 
•ged  quickly. 

Her  answer  was  slow  in  coming.  Her  look  into 
his  eyes  was  frank  and  straight,  and  he  could  guess 
her  words  were  weighed  and  gauged. 

"  I  don't  know  about  that,"  was  all  she  said 
finally;  but  his  fancy  leaped  at  the  several  words, 
ranging  and  conjecturing  their  possible  connota 
tions, 

"  But  we  have  so  much  we  might  be  saying  to  each 
other,"  he  tried  again.  "  So  much  we  ...  ought 
to  be  saying  to  each  other." 

"  So  I  apprehend,"  she  answered  quietly;  and 
again  that  frank,  straight  look  accompanied  her 
speech. 

So  she  did  apprehend  —  the  thought  of  it  was 
flame  to  him,  but  his  tongue  was  not  quick  enough  to 
serve  him  to  escape  the  cool,  provoking  laugh  as  she 
turned  into  the  house. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  209 

Still  the  company  of  the  Big  House  thinned. 
Paula's  aunt,  Mrs.  Tully,  much  to  Graham's  dis 
appointment  (for  he  had  expected  to  learn  from  her 
much  that  he  wanted  to  know  of  Paula),  had  gone 
after  only  a  several  days'  stay.  There  was  vague 
talk  of  her  return  for  a  longer  stay;  but,  just  back 
from  Europe,  she  declared  herself  burdened  with  a 
round  of  duty  visits  which  must  be  performed  be 
fore  her  pleasure  visiting  began. 

O'Hay,  the  critic,  had  been  compelled  to  linger 
several  days  in  order  to  live  down  the  disastrous  cul 
mination  of  the  musical  raid  made  upon  him  by  the 
philosophers.  The  idea  and  the  trick  had  been 
Dick's.  Combat  had  joined  early  in  the  evening, 
when  a  seeming  chance  remark  of  Ernestine  had 
enabled  Aaron  Hancock  to  fling  the  first  bomb  into 
the  thick  of  O'Hay's  deepest  convictions.  Dar 
Hyal,  a  willing  and  eager  ally,  had  charged  around 
the  flank  with  his  blastic  theory  of  music  and  taken 
O'Hay  in  reverse.  And  the  battle  had  raged  until 
the  hot-headed  Irishman,  beside  himself  with  the 
grueling  the  pair  of  skilled  logomachists  were  giving 
him,  accepted  with  huge  relief  the  kindly  invitation 
of  Terrence  McFane  to  retire  with  him  to  the  tran 
quillity  and  repose  of  the  stag  room,  where,  over  a 
soothing  highball  and  far  from  the  barbarians,  the 
two  of  them  could  have  a  heart  to  heart  talk  on  real 
music.  At  two  in  the  morning,  wild-eyed  and  be 
fuddled,  O'Hay  had  been  led  to  bed  by  the  upright- 
walking  and  unshakably  steady  Terrence. 

"  Never  mind,"  Ernestine  had  told  O'Hay  later, 
with  a  twinkle  in  her  eye  that  made  him  guess  the 
plot.  "  It  was  only  to  be  expected.  Those  rattle- 


210  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

brained  philosophers  would  drive  even  a  saint  to 
drink." 

"  I  thought  you  were  safe  in  Terrence's  hands," 
had  been  Dick's  mock  apology.  "  A  pair  of  Irish 
men,  you  know.  I'd  forgot  Terrence  was  case-hard 
ened.  Do  you  know,  after  he  said  good  night  to 
you,  he  came  up  to  me  for  a  yarn.  And  he  was 
steady  as  a  rock.  He  mentioned  casually  of  having 
had  several  sips,  so  I  ...  I  ...  never  dreamed 
...  er  ...  that  he  had  indisposed  you." 

When  Lute  and  Ernestine  departed  for  Santa  Bar 
bara,  Bert  Wainwright  and  his  sister  remembered 
their  long-neglected  home  in  Sacramento.  A  pair  of 
painters,  proteges  of  Paula,  arrived  the  same  day. 
But  they  were  little  in  evidence,  spending  long  days 
in  the  hills  with  a  trap  and  driver  and  smoking  long 
pipes  in  the  stag  room. 

The  free  and  easy  life  of  the  Big  House  went  on 
in  its  frictionless  way.  Dick  worked.  Graham 
worked.  Paula  maintained  her  seclusion.  The 
sages  from  the  madrono  grove  strayed  in  for  wordy 
dinners  —  and  wordy  evenings,  except  when  Paula 
played  for  them.  Automobile  parties,  from  Sacra 
mento,  Wickenberg,  and  other  valley  towns,  con 
tinued  to  drop  in  unexpectedly,  but  never  to  the  con 
fusion  of  Oh  Joy  and  the  house  boys,  whom  Graham 
saw,  on  occasion,  with  twenty  minutes'  warning,  seat 
a  score  of  unexpected  guests  to  a  perfect  dinner. 
And  there  were  even  nights  —  rare  ones  —  when 
only  Dick  and  Graham  and  Paula  sat  at  dinner,  and 
when,  afterward,  the  two  men  yarned  for  an  hour 
before  an  early  bed,  while  she  played  soft  things 
to  herself  or  disappeared  earlier  than  they. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  211 

But  one  moonlight  evening,  when  the  Watsons 
and  Masons  and  Wombolds  arrived  in  force, 
Graham  found  himself  out,  when  every  bridge  table 
was  made  up.  Paula  was  at  the  piano.  As  he  ap 
proached  he  caught  the  quick  expression  of  pleasure 
in  her  eyes  at  sight  of  him,  which  as  quickly  vanished. 
She  made  a  slight  movement  as  if  to  rise,  which  did 
not  escape  his  notice  any  more  than  did  her  quiet 
mastery  of  the  impulse  that  left  her  seated. 

She  was  immediately  herself  as  he  had  always  seen 
her  —  although  it  was  little  enough  he  had  seen  of 
her,  he  thought,  as  he  talked  whatever  came  into  his 
head,  and  rummaged  among  her  songs  with  her. 
Now  one  and  now  another  song  he  tried  with  her, 
subduing  his  high  baritone  to  her  light  soprano  with 
such  success  as  to  win  cries  of  more  from  the  bridge 
players. 

4  Yes,  I  am  positively  aching  to  be  out  again  over 
the  world  with  Dick,"  she  told  him  in  a  pause.  "If 
we  could  only  start  to-morrow !  But  Dick  can't  start 
yet.  He's  in  too  deep  with  too  many  experiments 
and  adventures  on  the  ranch  here.  Why,  what  do 
you  think  he's  up  to  now?  As  if  he  did  not  have 
enough  on  his  hands,  he's  going  to  revolutionize  the 
sales  end,  or,  at  least,  the  California  and  Pacific 
Coast  portion  of  it,  by  making  the  buyers  come  to  the 
ranch." 

"  But  they  do  do  that,"  Graham  said.  "  The  first 
man  I  met  here  was  a  buyer  from  Idaho." 

"  Oh,  but  Dick  means  as  an  institution,  you  know 
—  to  make  them  come  en  masse  at  a  stated  time. 
Not  simple  auction  sales,  either,  though  he  says  he 
will  bait  them  with  a  bit  of  that  to  excite  interest. 


2i2  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

It  will  be  an  annual  fair,  to  last  three  days,  in  which 
he  will  be  the  only  exhibitor.  He's  spending  half 
his  mornings  now  in  conference  with  Mr.  Agar  and 
Mr.  Pitts.  Mr.  Agar  is  his  sales  manager,  and  Mr. 
Pitts  his  showman." 

She  sighed  and  rippled  her  fingers  along  the  key 
board. 

"  But,  oh,  if  only  we  could  get  away — Timbuctoo, 
Mokpo,  or  Jericho." 

"  Don't  tell  me  you've  ever  been  to  Mokpo," 
Graham  laughed. 

She  nodded.  "Cross  my  heart,  solemnly,  hope  to 
die.  It  was  with  Dick  in  the  All  Away  and  in  the 
long  ago.  It  might  almost  be  said  we  honeymooned 
in  Mokpo." 

And  while  Graham  exchanged  reminiscences  of 
Mokpo  with  her,  he  cudgeled  his  brain  to  try  and 
decide  whether  her  continual  reference  to  her  hus 
band  was  deliberate. 

"  I  should  imagine  you  found  it  such  a  paradise 
here,"  he  was  saying. 

"  I  do,  I  do,"  she  assured  him  with  what  seemed 
unnecessary  vehemence.  "  But  I  don't  know  what's 
come  over  me  lately.  I  feel  it  imperative  to  be  up 
and  away.  The  spring  fret,  I  suppose;  the  Red 
Gods  and  their  medicine.  And  if  only  Dick  didn't 
insist  on  working  his  head  off  and  getting  tied  down 
with  projects !  Do  you  know,  in  all  the  years  of  our 
marriage,  the  only  really  serious  rival  I  have  ever 
had  has  been  this  ranch.  He's  pretty  faithful,  and 
the  ranch  is  his  first  love.  He  had  it  all  planned 
and  started  before  he  ever  met  me  or  knew  I  ex 
isted." 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  213 

"  Here,  let  us  try  this  together,"  Graham  said 
abruptly,  placing  the  song  on  the  rack  before  her. 

"  Oh,  but  it's  the  '  Gypsy  Trail,'  "  she  protested. 
"  It  will  only  make  my  mood  worse."  And  she 
hummed : 

''  '  Follow  the  Romany  patteran 

West  to  the  sinking  sun, 

Till  the  junk  sails  lift  through  the  homeless  drift, 
And  the  East  and  the  West  are  one.' 

"  What  is  the  Romany  patteran?  "  she  broke  off 
to  ask.  "  I've  always  thought  of  it  as  patter,  or 
patois,  the  Gypsy  patois,  and  somehow  it  strikes  me 
as  absurd  to  follow  a  language  over  the  world — > 
a  sort  of  philological  excursion." 

"  In  a  way  the  patteran  is  speech,"  he  answered. 
"  But  it  always  says  one  thing:  '  This  way  I  have 
passed.'  Two  sprigs,  crossed  in  certain  ways  and 
left  upon  the  trail,  compose  the  patteran.  But  they 
must  always  be  of  different  trees  or  shrubs.  Thus, 
on  the  ranch  here,  a  patteran  could  be  made  of 
manzanita  and  madrono,  of  oak  and  spruce,  of  buck 
eye  and  alder,  of  redwood  and  laurel,  of  huckle 
berry  and  lilac.  It  is  a  sign  of  Gypsy  comrade  to 
Gypsy  comrade,  of  Gypsy  lover  to  Gypsy  lover." 
And  he  hummed : 

"  *  Back  to  the  road  again,  again, 

Out  of  a  clear  sea  track; 
Follow  the  cross  of  the  Gypsy  trail, 
Over  the  world  and  back.'  " 

She  nodded  comprehension,  looked  for  a  moment 
with  troubled  eyes  down  the  long  room  to  the  card- 


2i4  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

players,  caught  herself  in  her  momentary  absentness, 
and  said  quickly: 

"  Heaven  knows  there's  a  lot  of  Gypsy  in  some 
of  us.  I  have  more  than  full  share.  In  spite  of  his 
bucolic  proclivities,  Dick  is  a  born  Gypsy.  And 
from  what  he  has  told  of  you,  you  are  hopelessly 
one." 

/  "  After  all,  the  white  man  is  the  real  Gypsy,  the 
dng  Gypsy,"  Graham  propounded.  "  He  has 
wandered  wider,  wilder,  and  with  less  equipment, 
than  any  Gypsy.  The  Gypsy  has  followed  in  his 
trails,  but  never  made  trail  for  him. —  Come ;  let  us 
\try  it." 

And  as  they  sang  the  reckless  words  to  their 
merry,  careless  lilt,  he  looked  down  at  her  and  won 
dered  —  wondered  at  her  —  at  himself.  This  was 
no  place  for  him  by  this  woman's  side,  under  her  hus 
band's  roof-tree.  Yet  here  he  was,  and  he  should 
have  gone  days  before.  After  the  years  he  was 
just  getting  acquainted  with  himself.  This  was  en 
chantment,  madness.  He  should  tear  himself  away 
at  once.  He  had  known  enchantments  and  mad 
nesses  before,  and  had  torn  himself  away.  Had  he 
softened  with  the  years  ?  he  questioned  himself.  Or 
was  this  a  profounder  madness  than  he  had  expe 
rienced?  This  meant  the  violation  of  dear  things 
—  things  so  dear,  so  jealously  cherished  and  guarded 
in  his  secret  life,  that  never  yet  had  they  suffered  vio 
lation. 

And  still  he  did  not  tear  himself  away.  He  stood 
there  beside  her,  looking  down  on  her  brown  crown 
of  hair  glinting  gold  and  bronze  and  bewitchingly 
curling  into  tendrils  above  her  ears,  singing  a  song 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  215 

that  was  fire  to  him  —  that  must  be  fire  to  her,  she 
being  what  she  was  and  feeling  what  she  had  al 
ready,  in  flashes,  half-unwittingly,  hinted  to  him. 

She  is  a  witch,  and  her  voice  is  not  the  least  of  her 
witchery,  he  thought,  as  her  voice,  so  richly  a 
woman's  voice,  so  essentially  her  voice  in  contra 
distinction  to  all  women's  voices  in  the  world,  sang 
and  throbbed  in  his  ear.  And  he  knew,  beyond 
shade  of  doubt,  that  she  felt  some  touch  of  this 
madness  that  afflicted  him;  that  she  sensed,  as  he 
sensed,  that  the  man  and  the  woman  were  met. 

They  thrilled  together  as  they  sang,  and  the 
thought  and  the  sure  knowledge  of  it  added  fuel  to 
his  own  madness  till  his  voice  warmed  unconsciously 
to  the  daring  of  the  last  lines,  as,  voices  and  thrills 
blending,  they  sang: 

'  The  wild  hawk  to  the  wind-swept  sky, 

The  deer  to  the  wholesome  wold, 
And  the  heart  of  a  man  to  the  heart  of  a  maid 

As  it  was  in  the  days  of  old  — 
The  heart  of  a  man  to  the  heart  of  a  maid, 

Light  of  my  tents  be  fleet, 
Morning  waits  at  the  end  of  the  world, 

And  the  world  is  all  at  our  feet/  ): 

He  looked  for  her  to  look  up  as  the  last  notes  died 
away,  but  she  remained  quiet  a  moment,  her  eyes 
bent  on  the  keys.  And  then  the  face  that  was  turned 
to  his  was  the  face  of  the  Little  Lady  of  the  Big 
House,  the  mouth  smiling  mischievously,  the  eyes 
filled  with  roguery,  as  she  said : 

"  Let  us  go  and  devil  Dick  —  he's  losing.  I've 
never  seen  him  lose  his  temper  at  cards,  but  he  gets 
ridiculously  blue  after  a  long  siege  of  losing. 


216  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  And  he  does  love  gambling,"  she  continued,  as 
she  led  the  way  to  the  tables.  "  It's  one  of  his  modes 
of  relaxing.  It  does  him  good.  About  once  or 
twice  a  year,  if  it's  a  good  poker  game,  he'll  sit  In 
all  night  to  it  and  play  to  the  blue  sky  if  they  take 
off  the  limit." 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

ALMOST  immediately  after  the  singing  of  the 
"  Gypsy  Trail,"  Paula  emerged  from  her  se 
clusion,  and  Graham  found  himself  hard  put, 
in  the  tower  room,  to  keep  resolutely  to  his  work 
when  all  the  morning  he  could  hear  snatches  of  song 
and  opera  from  her  wing,  or  laughter  and  scolding 
of  dogs  from  the  great  patio,  or  the  continuous  pulse 
for  hours  of  the  piano  from  the  distant  music  room. 
But  Graham,  patterning  after  Dick,  devoted  his 
mornings  to  work,  so  that  he  rarely  encountered 
Paula  before  lunch. 

She  made  announcement  that  her  spell  of  insomnia 
was  over  and  that  she  was  ripe  for  all  gaieties  and 
excursions  Dick  had  to  offer  her.  Further,  she 
threatened,  in  case  Dick  grudged  these  personal 
diversions,  to  fill  the  house  with  guests  and  teach 
him  what  liveliness  was.  It  was  at  this  time  that  her 
Aunt  Martha  —  Mrs.  Tully  —  returned  for  a  sev 
eral  days'  visit,  and  that  Paula  resumed  the  driving 
of  Duddy  and  Fuddy  in  the  high,  one-seated  Stude- 
baker  trap.  Duddy  and  Fuddy  were  spirited  trot 
ters,  but  Mrs.  Tully,  despite  her  elderliness  and 
avoirdupois,  was  without  timidity  when  Paula  held 
the  reins. 

As  Mrs.  Tully  told  Graham :  "And  that  is  a  con 
cession  I  make  to  no  woman  save  Paula.  She  is  the 
only  woman  I  can  trust  myself  to  with  horses.  She 
has  the  horse-way  about  her.  When  she  was  a  child 

217 


2 1 8  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

she  was  wild  over  horses.  It's  a  wonder  she  didn't 
become  a  circus  rider." 

More,  much  more,  Graham  learned  about  Paula 
in  various  chats  with  her  aunt.  Of  Philip  Desten, 
Paula's  father,  Mrs.  Tully  could  never  say  enough. 
Her  eldest  brother,  and  older  by  many  years,  he  had 
been  her  childhood  prince.  His  ways  had  been  big 
ways,  princely  ways  —  ways  that  to  commoner  folk 
had  betokened  a  streak  of  madness.  He  was  con 
tinually  guilty  of  the  wildest  things  and  the  most 
chivalrous  things.  It  was  this  streak  that  had 
enabled  him  to  win  various  fortunes,  and  with  equal 
facility  to  lose  them,  in  the  great  gold  adventure 
of  Forty-nine.  Himself  of  old  New  England  stock, 
he  had  had  for  great  grandfather  a  Frenchman  — 
a  trifle  of  flotsam  from  a  mid-ocean  wreck  and  landed 
to  grow  up  among  the  farmer-sailormen  of  the  coast 
of  Maine. 

"  And  once,  and  once  only,  in  each  generation, 
that  French  Desten  crops  out,"  Mrs.  Tully  assured 
Graham.  "  Philip  was  that  Frenchman  in  his  gen 
eration,  and  who  but  Paula,  and  in  full  measure,  re 
ceived  that  same  inheritance  in  her  generation. 
Though  Lute  and  Ernestine  are  her  half-sisters,  no 
one  would  imagine  one  drop  of  the  common  blood 
was  shared.  That's  why  Paula,  instead  of  going 
circus-riding,  drifted  inevitably  to  France.  It  was 
that  old  original  Desten  that  drew  her  over." 

And  of  the  adventure  in  France,  Graham  learned 
much.  Philip  Desten's  luck  had  been  to  die  when 
the  wheel  of  his  fortune  had  turned  over  and  down. 
Ernestine  and  Lute,  little  tots,  had  been  easy  enough 
for  Desten's  sisters  to  manage.  But  Paula,  who  had 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  219 

fallen  to  Mrs.  Tully,  had  been  the  problem  —  ''be 
cause  of  that  Frenchman." 

"  Oh,  she  is  rigid  New  England,"  .Mrs.  Tully  in 
sisted,  "  the  solidest  of  creatures  as  to  honor  and 
rectitude,  dependableness  and  faithfulness.  As  a 
girl  she  really  couldn't  bring  herself  to  lie,  except  to 
save  others.  In  which  case  all  her  New  England 
anpestry  took  flight  and  she  would  lie  as  magnificently 
as  her  father  before  her.  And  he  had  the  same 
charm  of  manner,  the  same  daring,  the  same  ready 
laughter,  the  same  vivacity.  But  what  is  lightsome 
and  blithe  in  her,  was  debonaire  in  him.  He  won 
men's  hearts  always,  or,  failing  that,  their  bitterest 
enmity.  No  one  was  left  cold  by  him  in  passing. 
Contact  with  him  quickened  them  to  love  or  hate. 
Therein  Paula  differs,  being  a  woman,  I  suppose, 
and  not  enjoying  man's  prerogative  of  tilting  at 
windmills.  I  don't  know  that  she  has  an  enemy  in 
the  world.  All  love  her,  unless,  it  may  well  be,  there 
are  cat-women  who  envy  her  her  nice  husband." 

And  as  Graham  listened,  Paula's  singing  came 
through  the  open  window  from  somewhere  down  the 
long  arcades,  and  there  was  that  ever-haunting 
thrill  in  her  voice  that  he  could  not  escape  remem 
bering  afterward.  She  burst  into  laughter,  and 
Mrs.  Tully  beamed  to  him  and  nodded  at  the  sound. 

'  There  laughs  Philip  Desten,"  she  murmured, 
"  and  all  the  Frenchwomen  behind  the  original 
Frenchman  who  was  brought  into  Penobscot,  dressed 
in  homespun,  and  sent  to  meeting.  Have  you  no 
ticed  how  Paula's  laugh  invariably  makes  everybody 
look  up  and  smile?  Philip's  laugh  did  the  same 
thing." 


220  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  Paula  had  always  been  passionately  fond  of  mu 
sic,  painting,  drawing.  As  a  little  girl  she  could  be 
traced  around  the  house  and  grounds  by  the  trail 
she  left  behind  her  of  images  and  shapes,  made  in 
whatever  medium  she  chanced  upon  —  drawn  on 
scraps  of  paper,  scratched  on  bits  of  wood,  modeled 
in  mud  and  sand. 

"  She  loved  everything,  and  everything  loved 
her,"  said  Mrs.  Tully.  "  She  was  never  timid  of 
,•  animals.  And  yet  she  always  stood  in  awe  of  them ; 
but  she  was  born  sense-struck,  and  her  awe  was 
44  beauty-awe.  Yes,  she  was  an  incorrigible  hero-wor 
shiper,  whether  the  person  was  merely  beautiful  or 
did  things.  And  she  never  will  outgrow  that  beauty- 
awe  of  anything  she  loves,  whether  it  is  a  grand 
piano,  a  great  painting,  a  beautiful  mare,  or  a  bit 
of  landscape. 

"  And  Paula  had  wanted  to  do,  to  make  beauty 
herself.  But  she  was  sorely  puzzled  whether  she 
should  devote  herself  to  music  or  painting.  In  the 
full  swing  of  work  under  the  best  masters  in  Boston, 
she  could  not  refrain  from  straying  back  to  her 
drawing.  From  her  easel  she  was  lured  to  model- 


"  And  so,  with  her  love  of  the  best,  her  soul  and 
/   Heart  full  of  beauty,  she  grew  c}dite  puzzled  and 
\    worried  over  herself,   as  to  which  talent  was  the 
\  greater  and  if  she  had  genius  at  all.     I  suggested  a 
Complete  rest  from  work  and  took  her  abroad  for  a 
year.     And  of  all  things,  she  developed  a  talent  for 
dancing.     But  always  she  harked  back  to  her  music 
and    painting.     No,    she    was    not    flighty.     Her 
trouble  was  that  she  was  too  talented — " 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  221 

"  Too  diversely  talented,"  Graham  amplified. 

"  Yes,  that  is  better,"  Mrs.  Tully  nodded.  "  But 
from  talent  to  genius  is  a  far  cry,  and  to  save  my 
life,  at  this  late  day,  I  don't  know  whether  the  child 
ever  had  a  trace  of  genius  in  her.  She  has  certainly 
not  done  anything  big  in  any  of  her  chosen  things." 

"  Except  to  be  herself,"  Graham  added. 

"  Which  is  the  big  thing,"  Mrs.  Tully  accepted 
with  a  smile  of  enthusiasm.  "  She  is  a  splendi^  s 

sual  woman,  very  unspoiled,  very  natural.     An) 
fter  all,  what  does  doing  things  amount  to? 
give  more  for  one  of  Paula's  madcap  escapades 
oh,  I  heard  all  about  swimming  the  big  stallion  — 1 
than  for  all  her  pictures  if  every  one  was  a  master- j 
piece.     But  she  was  hard  for  me  to  understand  at) 
rst.     Dick  often  calls  her  the  girl  that  never 
p.     But  gracious,   she   can  put  on  the  grand 
hen  she  needs  to.     I  call  her  the  most  mature  child 
I  have  ever  seen.     Dick  was  the  finest  thing  that 
ever  happened  to  her.     It  was  then  that  she  really 
seemed  for  the  first  time  to  find  herself.     It  was  this 
way." 

And  Mrs.  Tully  went  on  to  sketch  the  year  of 
travel  in  Europe,  the  resumption  of  Paula's  paint 
ing  in  Paris,  and  the  conviction  she  finally  reached 
that  success  could  be  achieved  only  by  struggle  and 
that  her  aunt's  money  was  a  handicap. 

"  And  she  had  her  way,"  Mrs.  Tully  sighed. 
"  She  —  why,  she  dismissed  me,  sent  me  home.  She 
would  accept  no  more  than  the  meagerest  allowance, 
and  went  down  into  the  Latin  Quarter  on  her  own, 
batching  with  two  other  American  girls.  And  she 
met  Dick.  Dick  was  a  rare  one.  You  couldn't 


222  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

guess  what  he  was  doing  then.  Running  a  cabaret 
—  oh,  not  these  modern  cabarets,  but  a  real  students' 
cabaret  of  sorts.  It  was  very  select.  They  were 
a  lot  of  madmen.  You  see,  he  was  just  back  from 
some  of  his  wild  adventuring  at  the  ends  of  the  earth, 
and,  as  he  stated  it,  he  wanted  to  stop  living  life  for 
a  while  and  to  talk  about  life  instead. 

"  Paula  took  me  there  once.  Oh,  they  were  en 
gaged  —  the  day  before,  and  he  had  called  on  me 
and  all  that.  I  had  known  '  Lucky '  Richard  For 
rest,  and  I  knew  all  about  his  son.  From  a  worldly 
standpoint,  Paula  couldn't  have  made  a  finer  mar 
riage.  It  was  quite  a  romance.  Paula  had  seen  him 
captain  the  University  of  California  eleven  to  vic 
tory  over  Stanford.  And  the  next  time  she  saw  him 
was  in  the  studio  she  shared  with  the  two  girls. 
She  didn't  know  whether  Dick  was  worth  millions 
or  whether  he  was  running  a  cabaret  because  he  was 
hard  up,  and  she  cared  less.  She  always  followed 
her  heart.  Fancy  the  situation :  Dick  the  uncatch- 
able,  and  Paula  who  never  flirted.  They  must  have 
sprung  forthright  into  each  other's  arms,  for  inside 
the  week  it  was  all  arranged,  and  Dick  made  his  call 
on  me,  as  if  my  decision  meant  anything  one  way  or 
the  other. 

"  But  Dick's  cabaret.  It  was  the  Cabaret  of  the 
Philosophers  —  a  small  pokey  place,  down  in  a  cel 
lar,  in  the  heart  of  the  Quarter,  and  it  had  only  one 
table.  Fancy  that  for  a  cabaret!  But  such  a  table ! 
A  big  round  one,  of  plain  boards,  without  even  an 
oil-cloth,  the  wood  stained  with  the  countless  drinks 
spilled  by  the  table-pounding  of  the  philosophers,  and" 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  223 

it  could  seat  thirty.     Women  were  not  permitted. 
An  exception  was  made  for  Paula  and  me. 

"  You've  met  Aaron  Hancock  here.     He  was  one 
of  the  philosophers,  and  to  this  day  he  swaggers  that 
he  owed  Dick  a  bigger  bill  that  never  was  paid  than 
any  of  his  customers.     And  there  they  used  to  meet, 
all  those  wild  young  thinkers,  and  pound  the  fableX 
and  talk  philosophy  in  all  the  tongues  of  Europe.,/ 
Dick  always  had  a  penchant  for  philosophers. 

"  But  Paula  spoiled  that  little  adventure.  No 
sooner  were  they  married  than  Dick  fitted  out  his 
schooner,  the  All  Away,  and  away  the  blessed  pair 
of  them  went,  honeymooning  from  Bordeaux  to 
Hongkong." 

"  And  the  cabaret  was  closed,  and  the  philosophers 
left  homeless  and  discussionless,"  Graham  remarked. 

Mrs.  Tully  laughed  heartily  and  shook  her  head. 

"  He  endowed  it  for  them,"  she  gasped,  her  haaid 
to  her  side.  "  Or  partially  endowed  it,  or  some 
thing.  I  don't  know  what  the  arrangement  was. 
And  within  the  month  it  was  raided  by  the  police  for 
an  anarchist  club." 

After  having  learned  the  wide  scope  of  her  in 
terests  and  talents,  Graham  was  nevertheless  sur 
prised  one  day  at  finding  Paula  all  by  herself  in  a 
corner  of  a  window-seat,  completely  absorbed  in  her 
work  on  a  piece  of  fine  embroidery. 

"  I  love  it,"  she  explained.  "  All  the  costly  nee 
dlework  of  the  shops  means  nothing  to  me  alongside 
of  my  own  work  on  my  own  designs.  Dick  used  to 
fret  at  my  sewing.  He's  all  for  efficiency,  you  know, 


224  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

elimination  of  waste  energy  and  such  things.  He 
thought  sewing  was  a  wasting  of  time.  Peasants 
could  be  hired  for  a  song  to  do  what  I  was  doing. 
But  I  succeeded  in  making  my  viewpoint  clear  to 
him. 

"  It's  like  the  music  one  makes  oneself.  Of 
Bourse  I  can  buy  better  music  than  I  make ;  but  to  sit 
/down  at  an  instrument  and  evoke  the  music  oneself, 
with  one's  own  fingers  and  brain,  is  an  entirely  dif 
ferent  and  dearer  satisfaction.  Whether  one  tries 
to  emulate  another's  performance,  or  infuses  the  per 
formance  with  one's  own  personality  and  interpreta 
tion,  it's  all  the  same.  It  is  soul-joy  and  fulfilment. 
'  Take  this  little  embroidered  crust  of  lilies  on  the 
edge  of  this  flounce  —  there  is  nothing  like  it  in  the 
world.  Mine  the  idea,  all  mine,  and  mine  the  de 
light  of  giving  form  and  being  to  the  idea.  There 
are  better  ideas  and  better  workmanship  in  the  shops ; 
but  this  is  different.  It  is  mine.  I  visioned  it,  and 
I  made  it.  And  who  is  to  say  that  embroidery  is 
not  art?" 

She  ceased  speaking  and  with  her  eyes  laughed 
the  insistence  of  her  question. 

"  And  who  is  to  say,"  Graham  agreed,  "  that  the 
adorning  of  beautiful  womankind  is  not  the  worthiest 
of  all  the  arts  as  well  as  the  sweetest?" 

"  I  rather  stand  in  awe  of  a  good  milliner  or 
modiste,"  she  nodded  gravely.  '  They  really  are 
artists,  and  important  ones,  as  Dick  would  phrase  it, 
in  the  world's  economy." 

Another  time,  seeking  the  library  for  Andean 
reference,  Graham  came  upon  Paula,  sprawled 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  225 

gracefully  over  a  sheet  of  paper  on  a  big  table  and 
flanked  by  ponderous  architectural  portfolios,  en 
gaged  in  drawing  plans  of  a  log  bungalow  or  camp 
for  the  sages  of  the  madrono  grove. 

"  It's  a  problem,"  she  sighed.  "  Dick  says  that  if 
I  build  it  I  must  build  it  for  seven.  We've  got  four 
sages  now,  and  his  heart  is  set  on  seven.  He  says 
never  mind  showers  and  such  things,  because  what 
philosopher  ever  bathes?  And  he  has  suggested 
seriously  seven  stoves  and  seven  kitchens,  because  it 
is  just  over  such  mundane  things  that  philosophers 
always  quarrel." 

"  Wasn't  it  Voltaire  who  quarreled  with  a  king 
over  candle-ends?"  Graham  queried,  pleasuring  in 
the  sight  of  her  graceful  abandon.  Thirty-eight! 
It  was  impossible.  She  seemed  almost  a  girl,  petu 
lant  and  flushed  over  some  school  task.  Then  he 
remembered  Mrs.  Tully's  remark  that  Paula  was  the 
most  mature  child  she  had  ever  known. 

It  made  him  wonder.  Was  she  the  one,  who,  un 
der  the  oaks  at  the  hitching  rails,  with  two  brief  sen 
tences  had  cut  to  the  heart  of  an  impending  situa 
tion?  "  So  I  apprehend,"  she  had  said.  What  had 
she  apprehended?  Had  she  used  the  phrase  glibly, 
without  meaning?  Yet  she  it  was  who  had  thrilled 
and  fluttered  to  him  and  with  him  when  they  had 
sung  the  "  Gypsy  Trail."  That  he  knew.  But 
again,  had  he  not  seen  her  warm  and  glow  to  the 
playing  of  Donald  Ware?  But  here  Graham's  ego 
had  its  will  of  him,  for  he  told  himself  that  with 
Donald  Ware  it  was  different.  And  he  smiled  to 
himself  and  at  himself  at  the  thought. 

'What     amuses     you?"     Paula     was     asking. 


226  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  Heaven  knows  I  am  no  architect.  And  I  challenge 
you  to  house  seven  philosophers  according  to  all  the 
absurd  stipulations  laid  down  by  Dick." 

Back  in  his  tower  room  with  his  Andean  books 
unopened  before  him,  Graham  gnawed  his  lip  and 
meditated.  The  woman  was  no  woman.  She  was 
the  veriest  child.  Or  —  and  he  hesitated  at  the 
thought  —  was  this  naturalness  that  was  overdone  ? 
Did  she  in  truth  apprehend?  It  must  be.  It  had 
to  be.  She  was  of  the  world.  She  knew  the  world. 
if  She  was  very  wise.  No  remembered  look  of  her 
jj/  gray  eyes  but  gave  the  impression  of  poise  and 
power.  That  was  it  —  strength !  He  recalled  her 
that  first  night  when  she  had  seemed  at  times  to  glint 
an  impression  of  steel,  of  thin  and  jewel-like  steel. 
In  his  fancy,  at  the  time,  he  remembered  likening  her 
strength  to  ivory,  to  carven  pearl  shell,  to  sennit 
twisted  of  maidens'  hair. 

And  he  knew,  now,  ever  since  the  brief  words  at 
the  hitching  rails  and  the  singing  of  the  "  Gypsy 
Trail,"  that  whenever  their  eyes  looked  into  each 
other's  it  was  with  a  mutual  knowledge  of  unsaid 
things. 

In  vain  he  turned  the  pages  of  the  books  for  the 
information  he  sought.  He  tried  to  continue  his 
chapter  without  the  information,  but  no  words 
flowed  from  his  pen.  A  maddening  restlessness  was 
upon  him.  He  seized  a  time  table  and  pondered  the 
departure  of  trains,  changed  his  mind,  switched  the 
room  telephone  to  the  house  barn,  and  asked  to 
have  Altadena  saddled. 

It  was  a  perfect  morning  of  California  early  sum 
mer.  No  breath  of  wind  stirred  over  the  drowsing 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  227 

fields,  from  which  arose  the  calls  of  quail  and  the 
notes  of  meadowlarks.  The  air  was  heavy  with 
lilac  fragrance,  and  from  the  distance,  as  he  rode 
between  the  lilac  hedges,  Graham  heard  the  throaty 
nicker  of  Mountain  Lad  and  the  silvery  answerinj 
whinney  of  the  Fotherington  Princess. 

Why  was  he  here  astride  Dick  Forrest's  horse? 
Graham  asked  himself.  Why  was  he  not  even  tEel 
on  the  way  to  the  station  to  catch  that  first  train  he 
had  noted  on  the  time  table?  This  unaccustomed 
weakness  of  decision  and  action  was  a  new  role  for 
him,  he  considered  bitterly.  But  —  and  he  was  on 
fire  with  the  thought  of  it  —  this  was  his  one  life,  and 
this  was  the  one  woman  in  the  world. 

He  reined  aside  to  let  a  herd  of  Angora  goats  go 
by.  Each  was  a  doe,  and  there  were  several  hun 
dred  of  them;  and  they  were  moved  slowly  by  the 
Basque  herdsmen,  with  frequent  pauses,  for  each  doe 
was  accompanied  by  a  young  kid.  In  the  paddock 
were  many  mares  with  new-born  colts ;  and  once,  re 
ceiving  warning  in  time,  Graham  raced  into  a  cross 
road  to  escape  a  drove  of  thirty  yearling  stallions 
being  moved  somewhere  across  the  ranch.  Their 
excitement  was  communicated  to  that  entire  portion 
of  the  ranch,  so  that  the  air  was  filled  with  shrill 
nickerings  and  squealings  and  answering  whinneys, 
while  Mountain  Lad,  beside  himself  at  sight  and 
sound  of  so  many  rivals,  raged  up  and  down  his 
paddock,  and  again  and  again  trumpeted  his  chal 
lenging  conviction  that  he  was  the  most  amazing 
and  mightiest  thing  that  had  ever  occurred  on  earth 
in  the  way  of  horse  flesh. 

Dick  Forrest  pranced  and  sidled  into  the  cross 


228  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

road  on  the  Outlaw,  his  face  beaming  with  delight 
at  the  little  tempest  among  his  many  creatures. 

"Fecundity!  Fecundity!"  —  he  chanted  in 
greeting,  as  he  reined  in  to  a  halt,  if  halt  it  might  be 
called,  with  his  tan-golden  sorrel  mare  a-fret  and 
a-froth,  wickedly  reaching  with  her  teeth  now  for 
his  leg  and  next  for  Graham's,  one  moment  pawing 
the  roadway,  the  next  moment,  in  sheer  impotence 
of  resentfulness,  kicking  the  empty  air  with  one  hind 
leg  and  kicking  the  air  repeatedly,  a  dozen  times. 

*  Those  youngsters  certainly  put  Mountain  Lad 
on  his  mettle,"  Dick  laughed.     "  Listen  to  his  song: 
4  Hear  me !     I   am  Eros.     I   stamp  upon  the 
hills.     I  fill  the  wide  valleys.     The  mares  hear  me, 
and  startle,  in  quiet  pastures;  for  they  know  me. 
The  land  is  filled  with  fatness,  and  the  sap  is  in  the 
trees.     It  is  the  spring.     The  spring  is  mine.     I  am 
monarch  of  my  kingdom  of  the  spring.     The  mares 
^emember    my   voice.     They    knew    me    aforetime 
/through  their  mothers  before  them.     Hear  me !     I 
/  am  Eros.     I  stamp  upon  the  hills,  and  the  wide  val- 
I  leys  are  my  heralds,  echoing  the  sound  of  my  ap 
proach.'  " 


CHAPTER  XIX 

AFTER  Mrs.  Tully's  departure,  Paula,  true  to 
her  threat,  filled  the  house  with  guests.  She 
seemed  to  have  remembered  all  who  had  been 
waiting  an  invitation,  and  the  limousine  that  met 
the  trains  eight  miles  away  was  rarely  empty  com 
ing  or  going.  There  were  more  singers  and  mu 
sicians  and  artist  folk,  and  bevies  of  young  girls  with 
their  inevitable  followings  of  young  men,  while 
mammas  and  aunts  and  chaperons  seemed  to  clutter 
all  the  ways  of  the  Big  House  and  to  fill  a  couple 
of  motor  cars  when  picnics  took  place. 

And  Graham  wondered  if  this  surrounding  of  her 
self  by  many  people  was  not  deliberate  on  Paula's 
part.  As  for  himself,  he  definitely  abandoned  work 
on  his  book,  and  joined  in  the  before-breakfast  swims 
of  the  hardier  younger  folk,  in  the  morning  rides 
over  the  ranch,  and  in  whatever  fun  was  afoot  in 
doors  and  out. 

Late  hours  and  early  were  kept;  and  one  night, 
Dick,  who  adhered  to  his  routine  and  never  appeared 
to  his  guests  before  midday,  made  a  night  of  it  at 
poker  in  the  stag-room.  Graham  had  sat  in,  and 
felt  well  repaid  when,  at  dawn,  the  players  received 
an  unexpected  visit  from  Paula  —  herself  past  one 
of  her  white  nights,  she  said,  although  no  sign  of  it 
showed  on  her  fresh  skin  and  color.  Graham  had 

229 


230  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

to  struggle  to  keep  his  eyes  from  straying  too  fre 
quently  to  her  as  she  mixed  golden  fizzes  to  rejuven 
ate  the  wan-eyed,  jaded  players.  Then  she  made 
them  start  the  round  of  "  jacks  "  that  closed  the 
game,  and  sent  them  off  for  a  cold  swim  before 
breakfast  and  the  day's  work  or  frolic. 

Never  was  Paula  alone.  Graham  could  only  join 
in  the  groups  that  were  always  about  her.  Although 
the  young  people  ragged  and  tangoed  incessantly, 
she  rarely  danced,  and  then  it  was  with  the  young 
men.  Once,  however,  she  favored  him  with  an  old- 
fashioned  waltz.  u  Your  ancestors  in  an  antedilu 
vian  dance, "  she  mocked  the  young  people,  as  she 
stepped  out;  for  she  and  Graham  had  the  floor  to 
themselves. 

Once  down  the  length  of  the  room,  the  two  were 
in  full  accord.  Paula,  with  the  sympathy  Graham 
recognized  that  made  her  the  exceptional  accom 
panist  or  rider,  subdued  herself  to  the  masterful  art 
of  the  man,  until  the  two  were  as  parts  of  a  sentient 
machine  that  operated  without  jar  or  friction. 
After  several  minutes,  finding  their  perfect  mutual 
step  and  pace,  and  Graham  feeling  the  absolute  giv 
ing  of  Paula  to  the  dance,  they  essayed  rhythmical 
pauses  and  dips,  their  feet  never  leaving  the  floor, 
yet  affecting  the  onlookers  in  the  way  Dick  voiced 
it  when  he  cried  outr^<rTKey  float!  They  float!  " 
The  music  was  the  \Waltz  of  Salome^  and  with 
its  slow-fading  end  they  postured  slower  and  slower 
to  a  perfect  close. 

There  was  no  need  to  speak.  In  silence,  without 
a  glance  at  each  other,  they  returned  to  the  company 
where  Dick  was  proclaiming: 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  231 

"  Well,  younglings,  codlings,  and  other  fry,  that's 
the  way  we  old  folks  used  to  dance.  I'm  not  saying 
anything  against  the  new  dances,  mind  you. 
They're  all  right  and  dandy  fine.  But  just  the  same 
it  wouldn't  injure  you  much  to  learn  to  waltz  prop 
erly.  The  way  you  waltz,  when  you  do  attempt  it, 
is  a  scream.  We  old  folks  do  know  a  thing  or  two 
that  is  worth  while." 

"  For  instance?"  queried  one  of  the  girls. 

"  I'll  tell  you.  I  don't  mind  the  young  genera 
tion  smelling  of  gasoline  the  way  it  does — " 

Cries  and  protests  drowned  Dick  out  for  a  mo 
ment. 

"  I  know  I  smell  of  it  myself,"  he  went  on.  "  But 
you've  all  failed  to  learn  the  good  old  modes  of  loco 
motion.  There  isn't  a  girl  of  you  that  Paula  can't 
walk  into  the  ground.  There  isn't  a  fellow  of  you 
that  Graham  and  I  can't  walk  into  a  receiving  hos 
pital. —  Oh,  I  know  you  can  all  crank  engines  and 
shift  gears  to  the  queen's  taste.  But  there  isn't  one 
of  you  that  can  properly  ride  a  horse  —  a  real  horse, 
in  the  only  way,  I  mean.  As  for  driving  a  smart 
pair  of  roadsters,  it's  a  screech.  And  how  many  of 
you  husky  lads,  hell-scooting  on  the  bay  in  your 
speed-boats,  can  take  the  wheel  of  an  old-time  sloop 
or  schooner,  without  an  auxiliary,  and  get  out  of 
your  own  way  in  her?  " 

"  But  we  get  there  just  the  same,"  the  same  girl 
retorted. 

"  And  I  don't  deny  it,"  Dick  answered.  "  But 
you  are  not  always  pretty.  I'll  tell  you  a  pretty 
sight  that  no  one  of  you  can  ever  present  —  Paula, 
there,  with  the  reins  of  four  slashing  horses  in  her 


232  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

hands,  her  foot  on  the  brake,  swinging  tally-ho  along 
a  mountain  road." 

On  a  warm  morning,  in  the  cool  arcade  of  the 
great  patio,  a  chance  group  of  four  or  five,  among 
whom  was  Paula,  formed  about  Graham,  who  had 
been  reading  alone.  After  a  time  he  returned  to 
his  magazine  with  such  absorption  that  he  forgot 
those  about  him  until  an  awareness  of  silence  pene 
trated  to  his  consciousness.  He  looked  up.  All  the 
others  save  Paula  had  strayed  off.  He  could  hear 
their  distant  laughter  from  across  the  patio.  But 
Paula !  He  surprised  the  look  on  her  face,  in  her 
eyes.  It  was  a  look  bent  on  him,  concerning  him.  * 
Doubt,  speculation,  almost  fear,  were  in  her  eyes; 
and  yet,  in  that  swift  instant,  he  had  time  to  note  that 
it  was  a  look  deep  and  searching  —  almost,  his  quick 
fancy  prompted,  the  look  of  one  peering  into  the 
just-opened  book  of  fate.  Her  eyes  fluttered  and 
fell,  and  the  color  increased  in  her  cheeks  in  an  un 
mistakable  blush.  Twice  her  lips  moved  to  the 
verge  of  speech;  yet,  caught  so  arrantly  in  the  act,  she 
was  unable  to  phrase  any  passing  thought.  Graham 
saved  the  painful  situation  by  saying  casually: 

u  Do  you  know,  I've  just  been  reading  De  Vries' 
eulogy  of  Luther  Burbank's  work,  and  it  seems  to 
me  that  Dick  is  to  the  domestic  animal  world  what 
Burbank  is  to  the  domestic  vegetable  world.  You 
are  life-makers  here  —  thumbing  the  stuff  into  new 
forms  of  utility  and  beauty."  4 

Paula,  by  this  time  herself  again,  laughed  and  ac 
cepted  the  compliment. 

"  I  fear  me,"  Graham  continued  with  easy  serious- 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  233 

ness,  "  as  I  watch  your  achievements,  that  I  can  only 
look  back  on  a  misspent  life.  Why  didn't  I  get  in 
and  make  things?  I'm  horribly  envious  of  both  of 
you." 

u  We  are  responsible  for  a  dreadful  lot  of  crea 
tures  being  born,"  she  said.  "  It  makes  one  breath 
less  to  think  of  the  responsibility." 

"  The  ranch  certainly  spells  fecundity,"  Graham 
smiled.  ;<  I  never  before  was  so  impressed  with  the 
flowering  and  fruiting  of  life.  Everything  here 
prospers  and  multiplies  — ' 

"Oh!"  Paula  cried,  breaking  in  with  a  sudden 
thought.  "  Some  day  I'll  show  you  my  goldfish.  I 
breed  them,  too  —  yea,  and  commercially.  I  supply 
the  San  Francisco  dealers  with  their  rarest  strains, 
and  I  even  ship  to  New  York.  And,  best  of  all,  I 
actually  make  money  —  profits,  I  mean.  Dick's 
books  show  it,  and  he  is  the  most  rigid  of  bookkeep 
ers.  There  isn't  a  tack-hammer  on  the  place  that 
isn't  inventoried;  nor  a  horse-shoe  nail  unaccounted 
for.  That's  why  he  has  such  a  staff  of  bookkeepers. 
Why,  do  you  know,  calculating  every  last  least  item 
of  expense,  including  average  loss  of  time  for  colic 
and  lameness,  out  of  fearfully  endless  columns  of 
figures  he  has  worked  the  cost  of  an  hour's  labor  for 
a  draught  horse  to  the  third  decimal  place." 

"  But  your  goldfish,"  Graham  suggested,  irritated 
by  her  constant  dwelling  on  her  husband. 

"  Well,  Dick  makes  his  bookkeepers  keep  track  of 
my  goldfish  in  the  same  way.  I'm  charged  every 
hour  of  any  of  the  ranch  or  house  labor  I  use  on  the 
fish  —  postage  stamps  and  stationery,  too,  if  you 
please.  I  have  to  pay  interest  on  the  plant.  He 


234  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

even  charges  me  for  the  water,  just  as  if  he  were  a 
city  water  company  and  I  a  householder.  And  still 
I  net  ten  per  cent.,  and  have  netted  as  high  as  thirty. 
But  Dick  laughs  and  says  when  I've  deducted  the 
wages  of  superintendence  —  my  superintendence,  he 
means  —  that  I'll  find  I  am  poorly  paid  or  else  am 
operating  at  a  loss ;  that  with  my  net  I  couldn't  hire 
so  capable  a  superintendent. 

"  Just  the  same,  that's  why  Dick  succeeds  in  his 
undertakings.  Unless  it's  sheer  experiment,  he 
never  does  anything  without  knowing  precisely,  to 
the  last  microscopic  detail,  what  it  is  he  is  doing." 
^  He  is  very  sure,"  Graham  observed. 
/  "  I  never  knew  a  man  to  be  so  sure  of  himself," 
/Paula  replied  warmly;  "  and  I  never  knew  a  man 
with  half  the  warrant.  I  know  him.  He  is  a 
genius  —  but  only  in  the  most  paradoxical  sense. 
He  is  a  genius  because  he  is  so  balanced  and  normal 
that  he  hasn't  the  slightest  particle  of  genius  in  him. 
Such  men  are  rarer  and  greater  than  geniuses.  I 
like  to  think  of  Abraham  Lincoln  as  such  a  type." 

"  I  must  admit  I  don't  quite  get  you,"  Graham 
said. 

"  Oh,  I  don't  dare  to  say  that  Dick  is  as  good, 
as  cosmically  good,  as  Lincoln,"  she  hurried  on. 
"  Dick  is  good,  but  it  is  not  that.  It  is  in  their  ex 
cessive  balance,  normality,  lack  of  flare,  that  they  are 
of  the  same  type.  Now  I  am  a  genius.  For,  see,  I 
do  things  without  knowing  how  I  do  them.  I  just 
do  them.  I  get  effects  in  my  music  that  way.  Take 
my  diving.  To  save  my  life  I  couldn't  tell  how  I 
swan-dive,  or  jump,  or  do  the  turn  and  a  half. 

"  Dick,  on  the  other  hand,  can't  do  anything  un- 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE 

less  he  clearly  knows  in  advance  how  he  is  going 
to  do  it.  He  does  everything  with  balance  and  fore 
sight.  He's  a  general,  all-around  wonder,  without 
ever  having  been  a  particular  wonder  at  any  one 
thing. —  Oh,  I  know  him.  He's  never  been  a  cham 
pion  or  a  record-breaker  in  any  line  of  athletics. 
Nor  has  he  been  mediocre  in  any  line.  And  so  with 
everything  else,  mentally,  intellectually.  He  is  an 
evenly  forged  chain.  He  has  no  massive  links,  no 
weak  links. " 

"  I'm  afraid  I'm  like  you,"  Graham  said,  "  that 
commoner  and  lesser  creature,  a  genius.  For  I,  too, 
on  occasion,  flare  and  do  the  most  unintentional 
things.  And  I  am  not  above  falling  on  my  knees 
before  mystery." 

"  And  Dick  hates  mystery  —  or  it  would  seem  he 
does.  Not  content  with  knowing  how  —  he  is 
eternally  seeking  the  why  of  the  how.  Mystery  is  a  \ 
challenge  to  him.  It  excites  him  like  a  red  rag  does 
a  bull.  At  once  he  is  for  ripping  the  husks  and 
the  heart  from  mystery,  so  that  he  will  know  the 
how  and  the  why,  when  it  will  be  no  longer  mystery 
but  a  generalization  and  a  scientifically  demonstrable 
fact" 

Much  of  the  growing  situation  was  veiled  to  the 
three  figures  of  it.  Graham  did  not  know  of  Paula's 
desperate  efforts  to  cling  close  to  her  husband,  who, 
himself  desperately  busy  with  his  thousand  plans 
and  projects,  was  seeing  less  and  less  of  his  com 
pany.  He  always  appeared  at  lunch,  but  it  was  a 
rare  afternoon  when  he  could  go  out  with  his  guests. 
Paula  did  know,  from  the  multiplicity  of  long,  code 


236  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

telegrams  from  Mexico,  that  things  were  in  a  parlous 
state  with  the  Harvest  Group.  Also,  she  saw  the 
agents  and  emissaries  of  foreign  investors  in  Mexico, 
always  in  haste  and  often  inopportune,  arriving  at 
the  ranch  to  confer  with  Dick.  Beyond  his  com 
plaint  that  they  ate  the  heart  out  of  his  time,  he  gave 
her  no  clew  to  the  matters  discussed. 

"  My !  I  wish  you  weren't  so  busy,"  she  sighed 
in  his  arms,  on  his  knees,  one  fortunate  morning, 
when,  at  eleven  o'clock,  she  had  caught  him  alone. 

It  was  true,  she  had  interrupted  the  dictation  of 
a  letter  into  the  phonograph;  and  the  sigh  had  been 
evoked  by  the  warning  cough  of  Bonbright,  whom 
she  saw  entering  with  more  telegrams  in  his  hand. 

;<  Won't  you  let  me  drive  you  this  afternoon,  be 
hind  Duddy  and  Fuddy,  just  you  and  me,  and  cut  the 
crowd?  "  she  begged. 

He  shook  his  head  and  smiled. 

1  You'll  meet  at  lunch  a  weird  combination,"  he 
explained.  "  Nobody  else  needs  to  know,  but  I'll 
tell  you."  He  lowered  his  voice,  while  Bonbright 
discreetly  occupied  himself  at  the  filing  cabinets. 
'  They're  Tampico  oil  folk.  Samuels  himself, 
President  of  the  Nacisco;  and  Wishaar,  the  big  in 
side  man  of  the  Pearson-Brooks  crowd  —  the  chap 
that  engineered  the  purchase  of  the  East  Coast  rail 
road  and  the  Tiuana  Central  when  they  tried  to  put 
the  Nacisco  out  of  business ;  and  Matthewson  —  he's 
the  hi-yu-skookum  big  chief  this  side  the  Atlantic  of 
the  Palmerston  interests  —  you  know,  the  English 
crowd  that  fought  the  Nacisco  and  the  Pearson- 
Brooks  bunch  so  hard;  and,  oh,  there'll  be  several 
others.  It  shows  you  that  things  are  rickety  down 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  237 

Mexico  way  when  such  a  bunch  stops  scrapping  and 
gets  together. 

"  You  see,  they  are  oil,  and  I'm  important  in  my 
way  down  there,  and  they  want  me  to  swing  the 
mining  interests  in  with  the  oil.  Truly,  big  things 
arc  in  the  air,  and  we've  got  to  hang  together  and 
do  something  or  get  out  of  Mexico.  And  I'll  admit, 
after  they  gave  me  the  turn-down  in  the  trouble  three 
years  ago,  that  I've  sulked  in  my  tent  and  made  them 
come  to  see  me." 

He  caressed  her  and  called  her  his  armful  of  dear 
est  woman,  although  she  detected  his  eye  roving  im 
patiently  to  the  phonograph  with  its  unfinished  let 
ter. 

"  And  so,"  he  concluded,  with  a  pressure  of  his 
arms  about  her  that  seemed  to  hint  that  her  moment 
with  him  was  over  and  she  must  go,  "  that  means  the 
afternoon.  None  will  stop  over.  And  they'll  be 
off  and  away  before  dinner." 

She  slipped  off  his  knees  and  out  of  his  arms  with 
unusual  abruptness,  and  stood  straight  up  before 
him,  her  eyes  flashing,  her  cheeks  white,  her  face  set 
with  determination,  as  if  about  to  say  something  of 
grave  importance.  But  a  bell  tinkled  softly,  and  he 
reached  for  the  desk  telephone. 

Paula  drooped,  and  sighed  inaudibly,  and,  as  she 
went  down  the  room  and  out  the  door,  and  as  Bon- 
bright  stepped  eagerly  forward  with  the  telegrams, 
she  could  hear  the  beginning  of  her  husband's  con 
versation  : 

"  No.  It  is  impossible.  He's  got  to  come 
through,  or  I'll  put  him  out  of  business.  That  gen 
tleman's  agreement  is  all  poppycock.  If  it  were 


23 8  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

only  that,  of  course  he  could  break  it.  But  I've  got 
some  mighty  interesting  correspondence  that  he's 
forgotten  about.  .  .  .  Yes,  yes;  it  will  clinch  it  in 
any  court  of  law.  I'll  have  the  file  in  your  office 
by  five  this  afternoon.  And  tell  him,  for  me,  that  if 
he  tries  to  put  through  this  trick,  I'll  break  him. 
I'll  put  a  competing  line  on,  and  his  steamboats  will 
be  in  the  receiver's  hands  inside  a  year.  .  ,  .  And 
.  .  .  hello,  are  you  there?  .  .  .  And  just  look  up 
that  point  I  suggested.  I  am  rather  convinced  you'll 
find  the  Interstate  Commerce  has  got  him  on  two 
counts  .  .  ." 

Nor  did  Graham,  nor  even  Paula,  imagine  that 
Dick  —  the  keen  one,  the  deep  one,  who  could  see 
and  sense  things  yet  to  occur  and  out  of  intangible 
nuances  and  glimmerings  build  shrewd  speculations 
and  hypotheses  that  subsequent  events  often  proved 
correct  —  was  already  sensing  what  had  not  hap 
pened  but  what  might  happen.  He  had  not  heard 
Paula's  brief  significant  words  at  the  hitching  post; 
nor  had  he  seen  Graham  catch  her  in  that  deep  scrut 
iny  of  him  under  the  arcade.  Dick  had  heard 
nothing,  seen  little,  but  sensed  much;  and,  even  in 
advance  of  Paula,  had  he  apprehended  in  vague  ways 
what  she  afterward  had  come  to  apprehend. 

The  most  tangible  thing  he  had  to  build  on  was 
the  night,  immersed  in  bridge,  when  he  had  not  been 
unaware  of  the  abrupt  leaving  of  the  piano  after 
the  singing  of  the  "  Gypsy  Trail  " ;  nor  when,  in  care 
less  smiling  greeting  of  them  when  they  came  down 
the  room  to  devil  him  over  his  losing,  had  he  failed 
to  receive  a  hint  or  feeling  of  something  unusual  in 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  239 

Paula's  roguish  teasing  face.  On  the  moment, 
laughing  retorts,  giving  as  good  as  she  sent,  Dick's 
own  laughing  eyes  had  swept  over  Graham  beside 
her  and  likewise  detected  the  unusual.  The  man 
was  overstrung,  had  been  Dick's  mental  note  at  the 
time.  But  why  should  he  be  overstrung?  Was 
there  any  connection  between  his  overstrungness  and 
the  sudden  desertion  by  Paula  of  the  piano?  And 
all  the  while  these  questions  were  slipping  through 
his  thoughts,  he  had  laughed  at  their  sallies,  dealt, 
sorted  his  hand,  and  won  the  bid  on  no  trumps. 

Yet  to  himself  he  had  continued  to  discount  as 
absurd  and  preposterous  the  possibility  of  his  vague 
apprehension  ever  being  realized.  It  was  a  chance 
guess,  a  silly  speculation,  based  upon  the  most  trivial 
data,  he  sagely  concluded.  It  merely  connoted  the 
attractiveness  of  his  wife  and  of  his  friend.  But 
—  and  on  occasional  moments  he  could  not  will  the 
thought  from  coming  uppermost  in  his  mind  —  why 
had  they  broken  off  from  singing  that  evening? 
Why  had  he  received  the  feeling  that  there  was 
something  unusual  about  it?  Why  had  Graham 
been  overstrung? 

Nor  did  Bonbright,  one  morning,  taking  dicta 
tion  of  a  telegram  in  the  last  hour  before  noon, 
know  that  Dick's  casual  sauntering  to  the  window, 
still  dictating,  had  been  caused  by  the  faint  sound 
of  hoofs  on  the  driveway.  It  was  not  the  first  of 
recent  mornings  that  Dick  had  so  sauntered  to  the 
window,  to  glance  out  with  apparent  absentness  at 
the  rush  of  the  morning  riding  party  in  the  last  dash 
home  to  the  hitching  rails.  But  he  knew,  on  this 


24o  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

morning,  before  the  first  figures  came  in  sight  whose 
those  figures  would  be. 

"  Braxton  is  safe,"  he  went  on  with  the  dictation 
without  change  of  tone,  his  eyes  on  the  road  where 
the  riders  must  first  come  into  view.  "  If  things 
break  he  can  get  out  across  the  mountains  into  Ari 
zona.  See  Connors  immediately.  Braxton  left 
Connors  complete  instructions.  Connors  to-morrow 
in  Washington.  Give  me  fullest  details  any  move 
—  signed." 

Up  the  driveway  the  Fawn  and  Altadena  clattered 
neck  and  neck.  Dick  had  not  been  disappointed  in 
the  figures  he  expected  to  see.  From  the  rear,  cries 
and  laughter  and  the  sound  of  many  hoofs  tokened 
that  the  rest  of  the  party  was  close  behind. 

"  And  the  next  one,  Mr.  Bonbright,  please  put 
in  the  Harvest  code,"  Dick  went  on  steadily,  while 
to  himself  he  was  commenting  that  Graham  was  a 
passable  rider  but  not  an  excellent  one,  and  that  it 
would  have  to  be  seen  to  that  he  was  given  a  heavier 
horse  than  Altadena.  "  It  is  to  Jeremy  Braxton. 
Send  it  both  ways.  There  is  a  chance  one  or  the 
other  may  get  through  .  .  ." 


CHAPTER  XX 

ONCE  again  the  tide  of  guests  ebbed  from  the 
Big  House,  and  more  than  one  lunch  and 
dinner  found  only  the  two  men  and  Paula 
at  the  table.     On  such  evenings,  while  Graham  and 
Dick  yarned  for  their  hour  before  bed,  Paula  no 
longer  played  soft  things  to  herself  at  the  piano,  but 
sat  with  them  doing  fine  embroidery  and  listening 
to  the  talk. 

Both  men  had  much  in  common,  had  lived  life  in 
somewhat  similar  ways,  and  regarded  life  from  the 
same  angles.  Their  philosophy  was  harsh  rather 
than  sentimental,  and  both  were  realists.  Paula 
made  a  practice  of  calling  them  the  pair  of  "  Brass 
Tacks." 

"  Oh,  yes,"  she  laughed  to  them,  "  I  understand 
your  attitude.  You  are  successes,  the  pair  of  you 
—  physical  successes,  I  mean.  You  have  health. 
You  are  resistant.  You  can  stand  things.  You 
have  survived  where  men  less  resistant  have  gone 
down.  You  pull  through  African  fevers  and  bury 
the  other  fellows.  This  poor  chap  gets  pneumonia 
in  Cripple  Creek  and  cashes  in  before  you  can  get 
him  to  sea  level.  Now  why  didn't  you  get  pneu 
monia?  Because  you  were  more  deserving?  Be 
cause  you  had  lived  more  virtuously?  Because  you 
were  more  careful  of  risks  and  took  more  precau 
tions?" 

241 


242  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

She  shook  her  head. 

"  No.  Because  you  were  luckier  —  I  mean  by 
birth,  by  possession  of  constitution  and  stamina. 
Why,  Dick  buried  his  three  mates  and  two  engineers 
at  Guayaquil.  Yellow  fever.  Why  didn't  the  yel 
low  fever  germ,  or  whatever  it  is,  kill  Dick?  And 
the  same  with  you,  Mr.  Broad-shouldered  Deep- 
chested  Graham.  In  this  last  trip  of  yours,  why 
didn't  you  die  in  the  swamps  instead  of  your  photog 
rapher?  Come.  Confess.  How  heavy  was  he? 
How  broad  were  his  shoulders?  How  deep  his 
chest  ?  —  wide  his  nostrils  ?  —  tough  his  resistance  ?  " 

"  He  weighed  a  hundred  and  thirty-five,"  Graham 
admitted  ruefully.  "  But  he  looked  all  right  and  fit 
at  the  start.  I  think  I  was  more  surprised  than  he 
when  he  turned  up  his  toes."  Graham  shook  his 
head.  "  It  wasn't  because  he  was  a  light  weight 
and  small.  The  small  men  are  usually  the  tough 
est,  other  things  being  equal.  But  you've  put  your 
finger  on  the  reason  just  the  same.  He  didn't  have 
the  physical  stamina,  the  resistance. —  You  know 
what  I  mean,  Dick?  " 

"  In  a  way  it's  like  the  quality  of  muscle  and  heart 
that  enables  some  prizefighters  to  go  the  distance  — 
twenty,  thirty,  forty  rounds,  say,"  Dick  concurred. 
"  Right  now,  in  San  Francisco,  there  are  several  hun 
dred  youngsters  dreaming  of  success  in  the  ring. 
I've  watched  them  trying  out.  All  look  good,  fine- 
bodied,  healthy,  fit  as  fiddles,  and  young.  And  their 
spirits  are  most  willing.  And  not  one  in  ten  of  them 
can  last  ten  rounds.  I  don't  mean  they  get  knocked 
out.  I  mean  they  blow  up.  Their  muscles  and 
their  hearts  are  not  made  out  of  first-grade  fiber. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  243 


They  simply  are  not  made  to  move  at  high  speed  and 
tension  for  ten  rounds.  And  some  of  them  blow 
up  in  four  or  five  rounds.  And  not  one  in  forty  can 
go  the  twenty-round  route,  give  and  take,  hammer 
and  tongs,  one  minute  of  rest  to  three  of  fight,  for  a 
full  hour  of  fighting.  And  the  lad  who  can  last  forty 
rounds  is  one  in  ten  thousand  —  lads  like  Nelson, 
Cans,  and  Wolgast. 

"  You  understand  the  point  I  am  making,"  Paula 
took  up.  "  Here  are  the  pair  of  you.  Neither  will 
see  forty  again.  You're  a  pair  of  hard-bitten  sin 
ners.  You've  gone  through  hardship  and  exposure 
that  dropped  others  all  along  the  way.  You've  had 
your  fun  and  folly.  You've  roughed  and  rowdied 
over  the  world — " 

u  Played  the  wild  ass,"  Graham  laughed  in. 

"  And  drunk  deep,"  Paula  added.  '  Why,  even 
alcohol  hasn't  burned  you.  You  were  too  tough. 
You  put  the  other  fellows  under  the  table,  or  into 
the  hospital  or  the  grave,  and  went  your  gorgeous 
way,  a  song  on  your  lips,  with  tissues  uncorroded, 
and  without  even  the  morning-after  headache.  And 
the  point  is  that  you  are  successes.  Your  muscles 
are  blond-beast  muscles,  your  vital  organs  are  blond- 
beast  organs.  And  from  all  this  emanates  your 
blond-beast  philosophy.  That's  why  you  are  brass 
tacks,  and  preach  realism,  and  practice  realism, 
shouldering  and  shoving  and  walking  over  lesser  and 
unluckier  creatures,  who  don't  dare  talk  back,  who, 
like  Dick's  prizefighting  boys,  would  blow  up  in  the 
first  round  if  they  resorted  to  the  arbitrament  of 
force." 

Dick  whistled  a  long  note  of  mock  dismay. 


244  THE  LITTLE  LADY 


uAnd  that's  why  you  preach  the  gospel  of  the 
strong,"  Paula  went  on.  "  If  you  had  been  weak 
lings,  you'd  have  preached  the  gospel  of  the  weak 
and  turned  the  other  cheek.  But  you  —  you  pair  of 
big-muscled  giants  —  when  you  are  struck,  being 
what  you  are,  you  don't  turn  the  other  cheek — " 

"  No,"  Dick  interrupted  quietly.  "  We  imme 
diately  roar,  *  Knock  his  block  off !  '  and  then  do 
it. —  She's  got  us,  Evan,  hip  and  thigh.  Philosophy, 
like  religion,  is  what  the  man  is,  and  is  by  him  made 
in  his  own  image." 

And  while  the  talk  led  over  the  world,  Paula 
sewed  on,  her  eyes  filled  with  the  picture  of  the  two 
big  men,  admiring,  wondering,  pondering,  without 
the  surety  of  self  that  was  theirs,  aware  of  a  slipping 
and  giving  of  convictions  so  long  accepted  that  they 
had  seemed  part  of  her. 

Later  in  the  evening  she  gave  voice  to  her  trouble. 

"  The  strangest  part  of  it,"  she  said,  taking  up  a 
remark  Dick  had  just  made,  "  is  that  too  much 
philosophizing  about  life  gets  one  worse  than  no 
where.  A  philosophic  atmosphere  is  confusing  — 
at  least  to  a  woman.  One  hears  so  much  about 
everything,  and  against  everything,  that  nothing  is 
sure.  For  instance,  Mendenhall's  wife  is  a  Lu 
theran.  She  hasn't  a  doubt  about  anything.  All  is 
fixed,  ordained,  immovable.  Star-drifts  and  ice-ages 
she  knows  nothing  about,  and  if  she  did  they  would 
not  alter  in  the  least  her  rules  of  conduct  for  men 
and  women  in  this  world  and  in  relation  to  the  next. 

"  But  here,  with  us,  you  two  pound  your  brass 
tacks,  Terrence  does  a  Greek  dance  of  epicurean 
anarchism,  Hancock  waves  the  glittering  veils  of 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  245 


Bergsonian  metaphysics,  Leo  makes  solemn  obeis 
ance  at  the  altar  of  Beauty,  and  Dar  Hyal  juggles 
his  sophistic  blastism  to  no  end  save  all  your  applause 
for  his  cleverness.     Don't  you  see?     The  effect  isr\ 
that  there  is  nothing  solid  in  any  human  judgment.  \jj 
Nothing  is  right.     Nothing  is  wrong.     One  is  left  j 
compassless,  rudderless,  chartless  on  a  sea  of  ideas. 
Shall  I  do  this  ?     Must  I  refrain  from  that  ?     Will  it 
be  wrong?     Is  there  any  virtue  in  it?     Mrs.  Men- 
denhall  has  her  instant  answer  for  every  such  ques 
tion.     But  do  the  philosophers  ?" 

Paula  shook  her  head. 

"  No.  All  they  have  is  ideas.  They  immediately 
proceed  to  talk  about  it,  and  talk  and  talk  and  talk, 
and  with  all  their  erudition  reach  no  conclusion  what 
ever.  And  I  am  just  as  bad.  I  listen  and  listen, 
and  talk  and  talk,  as  I  am  talking  now,  and  remain 
convictionless.  There  is  no  test — " 

"  But  there  is,"  Dick  said.     "  The  old,  eternal 
test  of  truth  —  Will  it  work?" 

"  Ah,  now  you  are  pounding  your  favorite  brass 
tack,"  Paula  smiled.  "  And  Dar  Hyal,  with  a  few 
arm-wavings  and  word-whirrings,  will  show  that  all 
brass  tacks  are  illusions;  and  Terrence,  that  brass 
tacks  are  sordid,  irrelevant  and  non-essential  things 
at  best;  and  Hancock,  that  the  overhanging  heaven 
of  Bergson  is  paved  with  brass  tacks,  only  that  they 
are  a  much  superior  article  to  yours;  and  Leo,  that 
there  is  only  one  brass  tack  in  the  universe,  and  that 
it  is  Beauty,  and  that  it  isn't  brass  at  all  but  gold." 

"  Come  on,  Red  Cloud,  go  riding  this  afternoon," 
Paula  asked  her  husband.  u  Get  the  cobwebs  out 


246  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

of  your  brain,  and  let  lawyers  and  mines  and  live 
stock  go  hang." 

"  I'd  like  to,  Paul,"  he  answered.  "  But  I  can't. 
I've  got  to  rush  in  a  machine  all  the  way  to  the  Buck 
eye.  Word  came  in  just  before  lunch.  They're  in 
trouble  at  the  dam.  There  must  have  been  a  fault 
in  the  under-strata,  and  too-heavy  dynamiting  has 
opened  it.  In  short,  what's  the  good  of  a  good 
dam  when  the  bottom  of  the  reservoir  won't  hold 
water?" 

Three  hours  later,  returning  from  the  Buckeye, 
Dick  noted  that  for  the  first  time  Paula  and  Graham 
had  gone  riding  together  alone. 

The  Wainwrights  and  the  Coghlans,  in  two  ma 
chines,  out  for  a  week's  trip  to  the  Russian  River, 
rested  over  for  a  day  at  the  Big  House,  and  were 
the  cause  of  Paula's  taking  out  the  tally-ho  for  a 
picnic  into  the  Los  Banos  Hills.  Starting  in  the 
morning,  it  was  impossible  for  Dick  to  accompany 
them,  although  he  left  Blake  in  the  thick  of  dictation 
to  go  out  and  see  them  off.  He  assured  himself  that 
no  detail  was  amiss  in  the  harnessing  and  hitching, 
and  reseated  the  party,  insisting  on  Graham  coming 
forward  into  the  box-seat  beside  Paula. 

"  Just  must  have  a  reserve  of  man's  strength 
alongside  of  Paula  in  case  of  need,"  Dick  explained. 
"  I've  known  a  brake-rod  to  carry  away  on  a  down 
grade  somewhat  to  the  inconvenience  of  the  passen 
gers.  Some  of  them  broke  their  necks.  And  now, 
to  reassure  you,  with  Paula  at  the  helm,  I'll  sing  you 
a  song: 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  247 

"What  can  little  Paula  do? 
Why,  drive  a  phaeton  and  two. 
Can  little  Paula  do  no  more? 
Yes,  drive  a  tally-ho  and  four." 

All  were  in  laughter  as  Paula  nodded  to  the 
grooms  to  release  the  horses'  heads,  took  the  feel 
of  the  four  mouths  on  her  hands,  and  shortened  and 
slipped  the  reins  to  adjustment  of  four  horses  into 
the  collars  and  taut  on  the  traces. 

In  the  babel  of  parting  gibes  to  Dick,  none  of  the 
guests  was  aware  of  aught  else  than  a  bright  morn 
ing,  the  promise  of  a  happy  day,  and  a  genial  host 
bidding  them  a  merry  going.  But  Paula,  despite  the 
keen  exhilaration  that  should  have  arisen  with  the 
handling  of  four  such  horses,  was  oppressed  by  a 
vague  sadness  in  which,  somehow,  Dick's  being 
behind  figured.  Through  Graham's  mind  Dick's 
merry  face  had  flashed  a  regret  of  conscience  that^ 
instead  of  being  seated  there  beside  this  one  woman, 
he  should  be  on  train  and  steamer  fleeing  to  the  other 
side  of  the  world. 

But  the  merriness  died  on  Dick's  face  the  moment 
he  turned  on  his  heel  to  enter  the  house.  It  was  a 
few  minutes  later  than  ten  when  he  finished  his  dic 
tation  and  Mr.  Blake  rose  to  go.  He  hesitated,  then 
said  a  trifle  apologetically: 

1  You  told  me,  Mr.  Forrest,  to  remind  you  of 
the  proofs  of  your  Shorthorn  book.  They  wired 
their  second  hurry-up  yesterday." 

"  I  won't  be  able  to  tackle  it  myself,"  Dick  re 
plied.  '*  Will  you  please  correct  the  typographical, 
submit  the  proofs  to  Mr.  Manson  for  correction  of 


248  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

fact  —  tell  him  be  sure  to  verify  that  pedigree  of 
King  of  Devon  —  and  ship  them  off." 

Until  eleven  Dick  received  his  managers  and  fore 
men.  But  not  for  a  quarter  of  an  hour  after  that 
did  he  get  rid  of  his  show  manager,  Mr.  Pitts,  with 
the  tentative  make-up  of  the  catalogue  for  the  first 
annual  stock-sale  on  the  ranch.  By  that  time  Mr. 
Bonbright  was  on  hand  with  his  sheaf  of  telegrams, 
and  the  lunch-hour  was  at  hand  ere  they  were 
cleaned  up. 

For  the  first  time  alone  since  he  had  seen  the 
tally-ho  off,  Dick  stepped  out  on  his  sleeping  porch 
to  the  row  of  barometers  and  thermometers  on  the 
wall.  But  he  had  come  to  consult,  not  them,  but  the 
girl's  face  that  laughed  from  the  round  wooden 
frame  beneath  them. 

"  Paula,  Paula,"  he  said  aloud,  "  are  you  surpris 
ing  yourself  and  me  after  all  these  years?  Are  you 
turning  madcap  at  sober  middle  age?  " 

He  put  on  leggings  and  spurs  to  be  ready  for  rid 
ing  after  lunch,  and  what  his  thoughts  had  been 
while  buckling  on  the  gear  he  epitomized  to  the  girl 
in  the  frame. 

"  Play  the  game,"  he  muttered.  And  then,  after 
a  pause,  as  he  turned  to  go :  "A  free  field  and  no 
favor  .  .  .  and  no  favor." 

\ i    - 

"  Really,  if  I  don't  go  soon,  I'll  have  to  become  a 
pensioner  and  join  the  philosophers  of  the  madrono 
grove,"  Graham  said  laughingly  to  Dick. 

It  was  the  time  of  cocktail  assembling,  and 
Paula,  in  addition  to  Graham,  was  the  only  one  of 
the  driving  party  as  yet  to  put  in  an  appearance. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  249 

"  If  all  the  philosophers  together  would  just  make 
one  book!"  Dick  demurred.  "Good  Lord,  man, 
you've  just  got  to  complete  your  book  here.  I  got 
you  started  and  I've  got  to  see  you  through  with  it." 

Paula's  encouragement  to  Graham  to  stay  on  - 
mere  stereotyped,  uninterested  phrases  —  was  music 
to  Dick.  His  heart  leapt.  After  all,  might  he  not 
be  entirely  mistaken?  For  two  such  mature,  wise, 
middle-aged  individuals  as  Paula  and  Graham  any 
such  foolishness  was  preposterous  and  unthinkable. 
They  were  not  young  things  with  their  hearts  on 
their  sleeves. 

"To  the  book!"  he  toasted.  He  turned  to 
Paula.  "  A  good  cocktail,"  he  praised.  "  Paul, 
you  excel  yourself,  and  you  fail  to  teach  Oh  Joy  the 
art.  His  never  quite  touch  yours. —  Yes,  another, 
please." 


CHAPTER  XXI 

GRAHAM,  riding  solitary  through  the  redwood 
canyons  among  the  hills  that  overlooked  the 
ranch  center,  was  getting  acquainted  with 
Selim,  the  eleven-hundred-pound,  coal-black  gelding 
which  Dick  had  furnished  him  in  place  of  the 
lighter  Altadena.  As  he  rode  along,  learning  the 
good  nature,  the  roguishness  and  the  dependable- 
ness  of  the  animal,  Graham  hummed  the  words  of 
the  "  Gypsy  Trail "  and  allowed  them  to  lead  his 
thoughts.  Quite  carelessly,  foolishly,  thinking  of 
bucolic  lovers  carving  their  initials  on  forest  trees, 
he  broke  a  spray  of  laurel  and  another  of  red 
wood.  He  had  to  stand  in  the  stirrups  to  pluck  a 
long-stemmed,  five-fingered  fern  with  which  to  bind 
the  sprays  into  a  cross.  When  the  patteran  was 
fashioned,  he  tossed  it  on  the  trail  before  him  and 
noted  that  Selim  passed  over  without  treading  upon 
it.  Glancing  back,  Graham  watched  it  to  the  next 
turn  of  the  trail.  A  good  omen,  was  his  thought, 
that  it  had  not  been  trampled. 

More  five-fingered  ferns  to  be  had  for  the  reach 
ing,  more  branches  of  redwood  and  laurel  brushing 
his  face  as  he  rode,  invited  him  to  continue  the  manu 
facture  of  patterans,  which  he  dropped  as  he  fash 
ioned  them.  An  hour  later,  at  the  head  of  the  can 
yon,  where  he  knew  the  trail  over  the  divide  was 
difficult  and  stiff,  he  debated  his  course  and  turned 
back. 

250 


THE  LITTLE  LADY  251 

Selim  warned  him  by  nickering.  Came  an  an 
swering  nicker  from  close  at  hand.  The  trail  was 
wide  and  easy,  and  Graham  put  his  mount  into  a 
fox  trot,  swung  a  wide  bend,  and  overtook  Paula  on 
the  Fawn. 

"  Hello !  "  he  called.     "  Hello !     Hello !  " 

She  reined  in  till  he  was  alongside. 

"  I  was  just  turning  back,"  she  said.  "  Why  did 
you  turn  back?  I  thought  you  were  going  over  the 
divide  to  Little  Grizzly." 

"  You  knew  I  was  ahead  of  you?  "  he  asked,  ad 
miring  the  frank,  boyish  way  of  her  eyes  straight- 
gazing  into  his. 

"  Why  shouldn't  I?  I  had  no  doubt  at  the  sec 
ond  patteran." 

"  Oh,  I'd  forgotten  about  them,"  he  laughed 
guiltily.  "  Why  did  you  turn  back?  " 

She  waited  until  the  Fawn  and  Selim  had  stepped 
over  a  fallen  alder  across  the  trail,  so  that  she  could 
look  into  Graham's  eyes  when  she  answered: 

"  Because  I  did  not  care  to  follow  your  trail. — 
To  follow  anybody's  trail,"  she  quickly  amended. 
"  I  turned  back  at  the  second  one." 

He  failed  of  a  ready  answer,  and  an  awkward  si 
lence  was  between  them.  Both  were  aware  of  this 
awkwardness,  due  to  the  known  but  unspoken  things. 

"  Do  you  make  a  practice  of  dropping  pat- 
terans?"  Paula  asked. 

"  The  first  I  ever  left,"  he  replied,  with  a  shake 
of  the  head.  "  But  there  was  such  a  generous  sup 
ply  of  materials  it  seemed  a  pity,  and,  besides,  the 
song  was  haunting  me." 

"  It  was  haunting  me  this  morning  when  I  woke 


252  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

up,"  she  said,  this  time  her  face  straight  ahead  so 
that  she  might  avoid  a  rope  of  wild  grapevine  that 
hung  close  to  her  side  of  the  trail. 

And  Graham,  gazing  at  her  face  in  profile,  at  her 
crown  of  gold-brown  hair,  at  her  singing  throat, 
felt  the  old  ache  at  the  heart,  the  hunger  and  the 
yearning.  The  nearness  of  her  was  a  provocation. 
The  sight  of  her,  in  her  fawn-colored  silk  corduroy, 
tormented  him  with  a  rush  of  visions  of  that  form 
of  hers  —  swimming  Mountain  Lad,  swan-diving 
through  forty  feet  of  air,  moving  down  the  long 
room  in  the  dull-blue  dress  of  medieval  fashion  with 
the  maddening  knee-lift  of  the  clinging  draperies. 

"  A  penny  for  them,"  she  interrupted  his  vision- 
ing.  His  answer  was  prompt. 

"Praise  to  the  Lord  for  one  thing:  you  haven't 
once  mentioned  Dick." 

"  Do  you  so  dislike  him?  " 

"  Be  fair,"  he  commanded,  almost  sternly.  u  It 
is  because  I  like  him.  Otherwise  .  .  ." 

"What?"  she  queried. 

Her  voice  was  brave,  although  she  looked  straight 
before  her  at  the  Fawn's  pricking  ears. 

"  I  can't  understand  why  I  remain.  I  should  have 
been  gone  long  ago." 

"Why?"  she  asked,  her  gaze  still  on  the  prick 
ing  ears. 

"Be  fair,  be  fair,"  he  warned.  "You  and  I 
scarcely  need  speech  for  understanding." 

She  turned  full  upon  him,  her  cheeks  warming 
with  color,  and,  without  speech,  looked  at  him. 
Her  whip-hand  rose  quickly,  half  way,  as  if  to  press 
her  breast,  and  half  way  paused  irresolutely,  then 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  253 

dropped  down  to  her  side.     But  her  eyes,  he  saw, 
were   glad   and   startled.     There   was   no   mistake?  , 
The  startle  lay  in  them,  and  also  the  gladness.     And/ 
he,    knowing   as    it   is   given   some   men   to   know,7 
changed  the  bridle  rein  to  his  other  hand,  reined 
close  to  her,  put  his  arm  around  her,  drew  her  till 
the  horses  rocked,  and,  knee  to  knee  and  lips  on  lips, 
kissed  his  desire  to  hers.     There  was  no  mistake  — 
pressure  to  pressure,  warmth  to  warmth,  and  with 
an  elate  thrill  he  felt  her  breathe  against  him. 

The  next  moment  she  had  torn  herself  loose. 
The  blood  had  left  her  face.  Her  eyes  were  blaz 
ing.  Her  riding-whip  rose  as  if  to  strike  him,  then 
fell  on  the  startled  Fawn.  Simultaneously  she 
drove  in  both  spurs  with  such  suddenness  and  force 
as  to  fetch  a  groan  and  a  leap  from  the  mare. 

He  listened  to  the  soft  thuds  of  hoofs  die  away 
along  the  forest  path,  himself  dizzy  in  the  saddle 
from  the  pounding  of  his  blood.  When  the  last 
hoof-beat  had  ceased,  he  half-slipped,  half-sank 
from  his  saddle  to  the  ground,  and  sat  on  a  mossy 
boulder.  He  was  hard  hit  —  harder  than  he  had 
deemed  possible  until  that  one  great  moment  when 
he  had  held  her  in  his  arms.  Well,  the  die  was  cast. 

He  straightened  up  so  abruptly  as  to  alarm  Selim, 
who  sprang  back  the  length  of  his  bridle  rein  and 
snorted. 

What  had  just  occurred  had  been  unpremeditated. 
It  was  one  of  those  inevitable  things.  It  had  to 
happen.  He  had  not  planned  it,  although  he  knew, 
now,  that  had  he  not  procrastinated  his  going,  had 
he  not  drifted,  he  could  have  foreseen  it.  And 
now,  going  could  not  mend  matters.  The  madness 


254  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

of  it,  the  hell  of  it  and  the  joy  of  it,  was  that  no 
longer  was  there  any  doubt.  Speech  beyond  speech, 
his  lips  still  tingling  with  the  memory  of  hers,  she 
had  told  him.  He  dwelt  over  that  kiss  returned,  his 
senses  swimming  deliciously  in  the  sea  of  remem 
brance. 

He  laid  his  hand  caressingly  on  the  knee  that  had 
touched  hers,  and  was  grateful  with  the  humility 
of  the  true  lover.  Wonderful  it  was  that  so  won 
derful  a  woman  should  love  him.  This  was  no  girl. 
This  was  a  woman,  knowing  her  own  will  and  wis 
dom.  And  she  had  breathed  quickly  in  his  arms, 
and  her  lips  had  been  live  to  his.  He  had  evoked 
what  he  had  given,  and  he  had  not  dreamed,  after 
the  years,  that  he  had  had  so  much  to  give. 

He  stood  up,  made  as  if  to  mount  Selim,  who  noz- 
zled  his  shoulder,  then  paused  to  debate. 

It  was  no  longer  a  question  of  going.  That  was 
definitely  settled.  Dick  had  certain  rights,  true. 
But  Paula  had  her  rights,  and  did  he  have  the  right 
to  go,  after  what  had  happened,  unless  .  .  .  unless 
she  went  with  him  ?  To  go  now  was  to  kiss  and  ride 
away.  Surely,  since  the  world  of  sex  decreed  that 
often  the  same  men  should  love  the  one  woman,  and 
therefore  that  perfidy  should  immediately  enter  into 
such  a  triangle  —  surely,  it  was  the  lesser  evil  to  be 
perfidious  to  the  man  than  to  the  woman. 

It  was  a  real  world,  he  pondered  as  he  rode 
slowly  along;  and  Paula,  and  Dick,  and  he  were 
real  persons  in  it,  were  themselves  conscious  real- 

s  who  looked  the  facts  of  life  squarely  in  the  face. 
This  was  no  affair  of  priest  and  code,  of  other  wis 
doms  and  decisions.  Of  themselves  must  it  be  set- 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  25. 

tied.  Some  one  would  be  hurt.  But  life  was  hurt. 
Success  in  living  was  the  minimizing  of  pain.  Dick 
believed  that  himself,  thanks  be.  The  three  of 
them  believed  it.  And  it  was  nothing  new  under  the 
sun.  The  countless  triangles  of  the  countless  genera 
tions  had  all  been  somehow  solved.  This,  then, 
would  be  solved.  All  human  affairs  reached  some 
solution. 

He  shook  sober  thought  from  his  brain  and  re 
turned  to  the  bliss  of  memory,  reaching  his  hand  to 
another  caress  of  his  knee,  his  lips  breathing  again 
to  the  breathing  of  hers  against  them.  He  even 
reined  Selim  to  a  halt  in  order  to  gaze  at  the  hollow 
resting  place  of  his  bent  arm  which  she  had  filled. 

Not  until  dinner  did  Graham  see  Paula  again, 
and  he  found  her  the  very  usual  Paula.  Not  even 
his  eye,  keen  with  knowledge,  could  detect  any  sign 
of  the  day's  great  happening,  nor  of  the  anger  that 
had  whitened  her  face  and  blazed  in  her  eyes  when 
she  half-lifted  her  whip  to  strike  him.  In  every 
thing  she  was  the  same  Little  Lady  of  the  Big  House. 
Even  when  it  chanced  that  her  eyes  met  his,  they 
were  serene,  untroubled,  with  no  hint  of  any  secret 
in  them.  What  made  the  situation  easier  was  the 
presence  of  several  new  guests,  women,  friends  of 
Dick  and  her,  come  for  a  couple  of  days. 

Next  morning,  in  the  music  room,  he  encountered 
them  and  Paula  at  the  piano. 

"  Don't  you  sing,  Mr.  Graham?"  a  Miss  Hoff 
man  asked. 

She  was  the  editor  of  a  woman's  magazine  pub 
lished  in  San  Francisco,  Graham  had  learned. 


256  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

uOh,  adorably,"  he  assured  her.  "Don't  I, 
Mrs.  Forrest?  "  he  appealed. 

"  It  is  quite  true,"  Paula  smiled,  u  if  for  no  other 
reason  that  he  is  kind  enough  not  to  drown  me 
quite." 

"  And  nothing  remains  but  to  prove  our  words," 
he  volunteered.  "  There's  a  duet  we  sang  the  other 
evening — "  He  glanced  at  Paula  for  a  sign. 
"  —  Which  is  particularly  good  for  my  kind  of  sing 
ing."  Again  he  gave  her  a  passing  glance  and  re 
ceived  no  cue  to  her  will  or  wish.  u  The  music  is 
in  the  living  room.  I'll  go  and  get  it." 

"  It's  the  '  Gypsy  Trail,'  a  bright,  catchy  thing," 
he  heard  her  saying  to  the  others  as  he  passed  out. 

They  did  not  sing  it  so  recklessly  as  on  that  first 
occasion,  and  much  of  the  thrill  and  some  of  the 
fire  they  kept  out  of  their  voices;  but  they  sang  it 
more  richly,  more  as  the  composer  had  intended  it 
and  with  less  of  their  own  particular  interpretation. 
But  Graham  was  thinking  as  he  sang,  and  he  knew, 
too,  that  Paula  was  thinking,  that  in  their  hearts 
another  duet  was  pulsing  all  unguessed  by  the  sev 
eral  women  who  applauded  the  song's  close. 

"  You  never  sang  it  better,  I'll  wager,"  he  told 
^atrla. 

/    For  he  had  heard  a  new  note  in  her  voice.     It 
/had  been   fuller,   rounder,  with  a   generousness  of 
I  volume  that  had  vindicated  that  singing  throat. 
V_  "  And  now,  because  I  know  you  don't  know,  I'll 
tell  you  what  a  patteran  is,"  she  was  saying.  .  .  . 


CHAPTER  XXII 

boy,  your  position  is  distinctly  Car- 
lylean,"  Terrence  McFane  said  in  fatherly 
tones. 

The  sages  of  the  madrono  grove  were  at  table, 
and,  with  Paula,  Dick  and  Graham,  made  up  the  din 
ner  party  of  seven. 

"  Mere  naming  of  one's  position  does  not  settle 
it,  Terrence,"  Dick  replied.  "  I  know  my  point  is 
Carlylean,  but  that  does  not  invalidate  it.  Hero- 
worship  is  a  very  good  thing.  I  am  talking,  not  as 
a  mere  scholastic,  but  as  a  practical  breeder  with 
whom  the  application  of  Mendelian  methods  is  a 
every-day  commonplace." 

"  And  I  am  to  conclude,"  Hancock  broke  in,  "  that 
a  Hottentot  is  as  good  as  a  white  man?  " 

"  Now  the  South  speaks,  Aaron,"  Dick  retorted^ 
with  a  smile.      "  Prejudice,  not  of  birth,  but  of  early 
environment,  is  too  strong  for  all  your  philosophy 
to  shake.     It  is  as  bad  as  Herbert  Spencer's  handi 
cap  of  the  early  influence  of  the  Manchester  School." 

"  And  Spencer  is  on  a  par  with  the  Hottentot?  " 
Dar  Hyal  challenged.  \  *.. 

Dick  shook  his  head. 

"  Let  me  say  this,  Hyal.     I  think  I  can  make  it 
clear.     The    average    Hottentot,    or    the    averag 
Melanesian,  is  pretty  close  to  being  on  a  par  with 
the  average  white  man.     The  difference  lies  in  th 

257 


258  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

there  are  proportionately  so  many  more  Hottentots 
and  negroes  who  are  merely  average,  while  there  is 
such  a  heavy  percentage  of  white  men  who  are  not 
average,  who  are  above  average.  These  are  what 
I  called  the  pace-makers  that  bring  up  the  speed 
of  their  own  race  average-men.  Note  that  they  do 
not  change  the  nature  or  develop  the  intelligence  of 
the  average-men.  But  they  give  them  better  equip 
ment,  better  facilities,  enable  them  to  travel  a  faster 
collective  pace. 

"  Give  an  Indian  a  modern  rifle  in  place  of  his 
bow  and  arrows  and  he  will  become  a  vastly  more 
efficient  game-getter.  The  Indian  hunter  himself 
has  not  changed  in  the  slightest.  But  his  entire  In 
dian  race  sported  so  few  of  the  above-average  men, 
that  all  of  them,  in  ten  thousand  generations,  were 
unable  to  equip  him  with  a  rifle." 

"  Go  on,  Dick,  develop  the  idea,"  Terrence  en 
couraged.  "  I  begin  to  glimpse  your  drive,  and 
you'll  soon  have  Aaron  on  the  run  with  his  race 
prejudices  and  silly  vanities  of  superiority." 

"  These  above-average  men,"  Dick  continued, 
u  these  pace-makers,  are  the  inventors,  the  discover 
ers,  the  constructionists,  the  sporting  dominants.  A 
race  that  sports  few  such  dominants  is  classified  as 
a  lower  race,  as  an  inferior  race.  It  still  hunts  with 
bows  and  arrows.  It  is  not  equipped.  Now  the 
average  white  man,  per  se,  is  just  as  bestial,  just  as 
stupid,  just  as  inelastic,  just  as  stagnative,  just  as 
retrogressive,  as  the  average  savage.  But  the  aver 
age  white  man  has  a  faster  pace.  The  large  num 
ber  of  sporting  dominants  in  his  society  give  him 
.the  equipment,  the  organization,  and  impose  the  law. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  259 

"What  great  man,  what  hero  —  and  by  that  I 
mean  what  sporting  dominant  —  has  the  Hottentot 
race  produced?  The  Hawaiian  race  produced  only 
one  —  Kamehameha.  The  negro  race  in  America, 
at  the  outside  only  two,  Booker  T.  Washington 
and  Du  Bois  —  and  both  with  white  blood  in 
them.  .  .  ." 

Paula  feigned  a  cheerful  interest  while  the  exposi 
tion  went  on.  She  did  not  appear  bored,  but  to 
Graham's  sympathetic  eyes  she  seemed  inwardly  to 
droop.  And  in  an  interval  of  tilt  between  Terrence 
and  Hancock,  she  said  in  a  low  voice  to  Graham : 

"  Words,  words,  words,  so  much  and  so  many  of 
them !  I  suppose  Dick  is  right  —  he  so  nearly  al 
ways  is;  but  I  confess  to  my  old  weakness  of  inabil 
ity  to  apply  all  these  floods  of  words  to  life  —  to 
my  life,  I  mean,  to  my  living,  to  what  I  should  do, 
to  what  I  must  do."  Her  eyes  were  unfalteringly 
fixed  on  his  while  she  spoke,  leaving  no  doubt  in 
his  mind  to  what  she  referred.  "  I  don't  know  what 
bearing  sporting  dominants  and  race-paces  have  on 
my  life.  They  show  me  no  right  or  wrong  or  way 
for  my  particular  feet.  And  now  that  they've 
started  they  are  liable  to  talk  the  rest  of  the  even 
ing.  .  .  . 

"  Oh,  I  do  understand  what  they  say,"  she  has 
tily  assured  him;  "  but  it  doesn't  mean  anything  to 
me.  Words,  words,  words  —  and  I  want  to  know 
what  to  do,  what  to  do  with  myself,  what  to  do  with 
you,  what  to  do  with  Dick." 

But  the  devil  of  speech  was  in  Dick  Forrest's 
tongue,  and  before  Graham  could  murmur  a  reply 
to  Paula,  Dick  was  challenging  him  for  data  on  the 


260  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

subject  from  the  South  American  tribes  among  which 
he  had  traveled.  To  look  at  Dick's  face  it  would 
have  been  unguessed  that  he  was  aught  but  a  care 
free,  happy  arguer.  Nor  did  Graham,  nor  did 
Paula,  Dick's  dozen  years'  wife,  dream  that  his 
casual  careless  glances  were  missing  no  movement  of 
a  hand,  no  change  of  position  on  a  chair,  no  shade 
of  expression  on  their  faces. 

What's  up?,  was  Dick's  secret  interrogation. 
Paula's  not  herself.  She's  positively  nervous,  and 
all  the  discussion  is  responsible.  And  Graham's  off 
color.  His  brain  isn't  working  up  to  mark.  He's 
thinking  about  something  else,  rather  than  about 
what  he  is  saying.  What  is  that  something  else? 

And  the  devil  of  speech  behind  which  Dick  hid  his 
secret  thoughts  impelled  him  to  urge  the  talk  wider 
and  wilder. 

"  For  once  I  could  almost  hate  the  four  sages," 
Paula  broke  out  in  an  undertone  to  Graham,  who 
had  finished  furnishing  the  required  data. 

Dick,  himself  talking,  in  cool  sentences  amplify 
ing  his  thesis,  apparently  engrossed  in  his  subject, 
saw  Paula  make  the  aside,  although  no  word  of  it 
reached  his  ears,  saw  her  increasing  nervousness, 
saw  the  silent  sympathy  of  Graham,  and  wondered 
what  had  been  the  few  words  she  uttered,  while  to 
the  listening  table  he  was  saying: 

"  Fischer  and  Speiser  are  both  agreed  on  the 
paucity  of  unit-characters  that  circulate  in  the  hered 
ity  of  the  lesser  races  as  compared  with  the  immense 
variety  of  unit-characters  in  say  the  French,  or  Ger 
man,  or  English.  ..." 

No  one  at  the  table  suspected  that  Dick  deliber- 


Cr\ 

OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  261 

^ — S 

ately  dangled  the  bait  of  a  new  trend  to  the  conver 
sation,  nor  did  Leo  dream  afterward  that  it  was 
the  master-craft  and  deviltry  of  Dick  rather  than  his 
own  question  that  changed  the  subject  when  he  de 
manded  to  know  what  part  the  female  sporting 
dominants  played  in  the  race. 

"  Females  don't  sport,  Leo,  my  lad,"  Terrence, 
with  a  wink  to  the  others,  answered  him.  14  Fe 
males  are  conservative.  They  keep  the  type  true. 
They  fix  it  and  hold  it,  and  are  the  everlasting  clog 
on  the  chariot  of  progress.  If  it  wasn't  for  the  fe 
males  every  blessed  mother's  son  of  us  would  be  a 
sporting  dominant.  I  refer  to  our  distinguished 
breeder  and  practical  Mendelian  whom  we  have 
with  us  this  evening  to  verify  my  random  state 
ments." 

"  Let  us  get  down  first  of  all  to  bedrock  and  find 
out  what  we  are  talking  about,"  Dick  was  prompt 
on  the  uptake.  "  What  is  woman?"  he  demanded 
with  an  air  of  earnestness. 

u  The  ancient  Greeks  said  woman  was  nature's 
failure  to  make  a  man,"  Dar  Hyal  answered,  the 
while  the  imp  of  mockery  laughed  in  the  corners  of 
his  mouth  and  curled  his  thin  cynical  lips  deri 
sively. 

Leo  was  shocked.  His  face  flushed.  There  was 
pain  in  his  eyes  and  his  lips  were  trembling  as  he 
looked  wistful  appeal  to  Dick. 

"The  half-sex,"  Hancock  gibed.  "  As  if  the 
hand  of  God  had  been  withdrawn  midway  in  the 
making,  leaving  her  but  a  half-soul,  a  groping  soul 
at  best." 

"  No !  no !  "  the  boy  cried  out.     "  You  must  not 


262  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

say  such  things !  —  Dick,  you  know.     Tell  them, 
tell  them." 

"  I  wish  I  could,"  Dick  replied.  "  But  this  soul 
discussion  is  vague  as  souls  themselves.  We  all 
know,  of  our  selves,  that  we  often  grope,  are  often 
lost,  and  are  never  so  much  lost  as  when  we  think 
where  we  are  and  all  about  ourselves, 
is  the  personality  of  a  lunatic  but  a  personality 
a  little  less,  or  very  much  less,  coherent  than  ours? 
tat  is  the  personality  of  a  moron?  Of  an  idiot? 
Of  a  feeble-minded  child?  Of  a  horse?  A  dog? 
A  mosquito?  A  bullfrog?  A  woodtick?  A  gar 
den  snail?  And,  Leo,  what  is  your  own  personality 
when  you  sleep  and  dream?  When  you  are  seasick? 
When  you  are  in  love?  When  you  have  colic? 
When  you  have  a  cramp  in  the  leg?  When  you  are 
smitten  abruptly  with  the  fear  of  death?  When  you 
are  angry?  When  you  are  exalted  with  the  sense  of 
the  beauty  of  the  world  and  think  you  think  all  inex 
pressible  unutterable  thoughts? 

"  I  say  think  you  think  intentionally.     Did  you 
really  think,  then  your  sense  of  the  beauty  of  the 
world  would  not  be  inexpressible,  unutterable.     It 
would  be  clear,  sharp,  definite.     You  could  put  it 
into  words.     Your  personality  would  be  clear,  sharp, 
and  definite   as  your  thoughts  and  words.     Ergo, 
Leo,  when  you  deem,  in  exalted  moods,  that  you 
sire  at  the  summit  of  existence,  in  truth  you  are  thrill 
ing,  vibrating,  dancing  a  mad  orgy  of  the  senses  and 
/not  knowing  a  step  of  the  dance  or  the  meaning  of 
/  the  orgy.     You  don't  know  yourself.     Your  soul, 
/  your  personality,  at  that  moment,  is  a  vague  and 
groping  thing.     Possibly  the  bullfrog,  inflating  him- 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  263 

self  on  the  edge  of  a  pond  and  uttering  hoarse 
croaks  through  the  darkness  to  a  warty  mate,  pos 
sesses  also,  at  that  moment,  a  vague  and  groping 
personality. 

"  No,  Leo,  personality  is  too  vague  for  any  of 
our  vague  personalities  to  grasp.  There  are  seem 
ing  men  with  the  personalities  of  women.  There 
are  plural  personalities.  There  are  two-legged  hu 
man  creatures  that  are  neither  fish,  flesh,  nor  fowl. 
We,  as  personalities,  float  like  fog-wisps  through 
glooms  and,  darknesses  and  light-flashings.  It  is 
all  fog  and  mist,  and  we  are  all  foggy  and  misty  in 
the  thick  of  the  mystery." 

"  Maybe  it's  mystification  instead  of  mystery  — 
man-made  mystification,"  Paula  said. 

"  There  talks  the  true  woman  that  Leo  thinks 
is  not  a  half-soul,"  Dick  retorted.  "  The  point  is, 
Leo,  sex  and  soul  are  all  interwoven  and  tangled  to 
gether,  and  we  know  little  of  one  and  less  of  the 
other." 

"  But  women  are  beautiful,"  the  boy  stammered. 

"  Oh,  ho !  "  Hancock  broke  in,  his  black  eyes 
gleaming  wickedly.  "  So,  Leo,  you  identify  woman 
with  beauty?  " 

The  young  poet's  lips  moved,  but  he  could  only 
nod. 

'  Very  well,  then,  let  us  take  the  testimony  of 
painting,  during  the  last  thousand  years,  as  a  reflex 
of  economic  conditions  and  political  institutions,  and 
by  it  see  how  man  has  molded  and  daubed  woman 
into  the  image  of  his  desire,  and  how  she  has  pef- 
mitted  him  — " 

'  You  must  stop  baiting  Leo,"  Paula 

, 


264  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  and  be  truthful,  all  of  you,  and  say  what  you  do 
know  or  do  believe/' 

"  Woman  is  a  very  sacred  subject,"  Dar  Hyal 
enunciated  solemnly. 

"  There  is  the  Madonna,"  Graham  suggested, 
stepping  into  the  breach  to  Paula's  aid. 

"And  the  cerebrale,"  Terrence  added,  winning 
a  nod  of  approval  from  Dar  Hyal. 

"  One  at  a  time,"  Hancock  said.  "  Let  us  con 
sider  the  Madonna-worship,  which  was  a  particular 
woman-worship  in  relation  to  the  general  woman- 
worship  of  all  women  to-day  and  to  which  Leo  sub 
scribes.  Man  is  a  lazy,  loafing  savage.  He  dis 
likes  to  be  pestered.  He  likes  tranquillity,  repose. 
And  he  finds  himself,  ever  since  man  began,  saddled 
to  a  restless,  nervous,  irritable,  hysterical  traveling 
companion,  and  her  name  is  woman.  She  has 
moods,  tears,  vanities,  angers,  and  moral  irresponsi 
bilities.  He  couldn't  destroy  her.  He  had  to  have 
her,  although  she  was  always  spoiling  his  peace. 
What  was  he  to  do?" 

"  Trust  him  to  find  a  way  —  the  cunning  rascal," 
Terrence  interjected. 

"  He  made  a  heavenly  image  of  her,"  Hancock 
kept  on.  "  He  idealized  her  good  qualities,  and  put 
her  so  far  away  that  her  bad  qualities  couldn't  get 
on  his  nerves  and  prevent  him  from  smoking  his 
quiet  lazy  pipe  of  peace  and  meditating  upon  the 
stars.  And  when  the  ordinary  every-day  woman 
tried  to  pester,  he  brushed  her  aside  from  his 
thoughts  and  remembered  his  heaven-woman,  the 
perfect  woman,  the  bearer  of  life  and  custodian  of 
immortality. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  265 

"  Then  came  the  Reformation.  Down  went  the 
worship  of  the  Mother.  And  there  was  man  still 
saddled  to  his  repose-destroyer.  What  did  he  do 
then?" 

"  Ah,  the  rascal,"  Terrence  grinned. 

"He  said:  'I  will  make  of  .you  a  dream  and 
an  illusion.'  And  he  did.  The  Madonna  was  his 
heavenly  woman,  his  highest  conception  of  woman. 
He  transferred  all  his  idealized  qualities  of  her  to 
the  earthly  woman,  to  every  woman,  and  he  has 
fooled  himself  into  believing  in  them  and  in  her 
ever  since  .  .  .  like  Leo  does." 

u  For  an  unmarried  man  you  betray  an  amazing 
intimacy  with  the  pestiferousness  of  woman,"  Dick 
commented.  "  Or  is  it  all  purely  theoretical?  " 

Terrence  began  to  laugh. 

"  Dick,  boy,  it's  Laura  Marholm  Aaron's  been 
just  reading.  He  can  spout  her  chapter  and  verse." 

"And  with  all  this  talk  about  woman  we  have 
not  yet  touched  the  hem  of  her  garment,"  Graham 
said,  winning  a  grateful  look  from  Paula  and  Leo. 

"  There  is  love,"  Leo  breathed.  "  No  one  has 
said  one  word  about  love." 

"  And  marriage  laws,  and  divorces,  and  polyg 
amy,  and  monogamy,  and  free  love,"  Hancock  rat- 
tl«d  off. 

"  And  why,  Leo,"  Dar  Hyal  queried,  "  is  woman, 
in  the  game  of  love,  always  the  pursuer,  the  hunt 
ress?" 

"  Oh,  but  she  isn't,"  the  boy  answered  quietly, 
with  an  air  of  superior  knowledge.  '  That  is  just 
some  of  your  Shaw  nonsense." 

"  Bravo,  Leo,"  Paula  applauded. 


266  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

Then  V7ilde  was  wrong  when  he  said  woman 
attacks  by  sudden  and  strange  surrenders?"  Dar 
Hyal  asjced. 

ut  don't  you  see,"  protested  Leo,  "  all  such 
talk  makes  woman  a  monster,  a  creature  of  prey." 
As  he  turned  to  Dick,  he  stole  a  side  glance  at  Paula 
and  love  welled  in  his  eyes.  "  Is  she  a  creature  of 
prey,  Dick?" 

"  No,"  Dick  answered  slowly,  with  a  shake  of 
head,  and  gentleness  was  in  his  voice  for  sake 
of  what  he  had  just  seen  in  the  boy's  eyes.  "  I 
cannot  say  that  woman  is  a  creature  of  prey.  Nor 
can  I  say  she  is  a  creature  preyed  upon.  Nor  will 
I  say  she  is  a  creature  of  unfaltering  joy  to  man. 
But  I  will  say  that  she  is  a  creature  of  much  joy  to 
man  — " 

"  And  of  much  foolishness,"  Hancock  added. 

"  Of  much  fine  foolishness,"  Dick  gravely 
amended. 

"  Let  me  ask  Leo  something,"  Dar  Hyal  said. 
"  Leo,  why  is  it  that  a  woman  loves  the  man  who 
beats  her?" 

"  And  doesn't  love  the  man  who  doesn't  beat 
her?"  Leo  countered. 

"  Precisely." 

"  Well,  Dar,  you  are  partly  right  and  mostly 
wrong. —  Oh,  I  have  learned  about  definitions 
from  you  fellows.  You've  cunningly  left  them  out 
of  your  two  propositions.  Now  I'll  put  them  in  for 
you.  A  man  who  beats  a  woman  he  loves  is  a  low 
type  man.  A  woman  who  loves  the  man  who  beats 
her  is  a  low  type  woman.  No  high  type  man  beats 
the  woman  he  loves.  No  high  type  woman,"  and 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  267 

all  unconsciously  Leo's  eyes  roved  to  Paula,  "  could 
love  a  man  who  beats  her." 

"  No,  Leo,"  Dick  said,  "  I  assure  you  I  have 
never,  never  beaten  Paula." 

"  So  you  see,  Dar,"  Leo  went  on  with  flushing 
cheeks,  u  you  are  wrong.  Paula  loves  Dick  with 
out  being  beaten." 

With  what  seemed  pleased  amusement  beaming  on 
his  face,  Dick  turned  to  Paula  as  if  to  ask  her  silent 
approval  of  the  lad's  words;  but  what  Dick  sought 
was  the  effect  of  the  impact  of  such  words  under 
the  circumstances  he  apprehended.  In  Paula's  eyes 
he  thought  he  detected  a  flicker  of  something  he 
knew  not  what.  Graham's  face  he  found  expres 
sionless  insofar  as  there  was  no  apparent  change 
of  the  expression  of  interest  that  had  been  there. 

"  Woman  has  certainly  found  her  St.  George  to 
night,"  Graham  complimented.  u  Leo,  you  shame 
me.  Here  I  sit  quietly  by  while  you  fight  three  drag 


ons." 


"  And  such  dragons,"  Paula  joined  in.  ;t  If  they 
drove  O'Hay  to  drink,  what  will  they  do  to  you, 
Leo?" 

"  No  knight  of  love  can  ever  be  discomfited  by  all 
the  dragons  in  the  world,"  Dick  said.  "  And  the 
best  of  it,  Leo,  is  in  this  case  the  dragons  are  more 
right  than  you  think,  and  you  are  more  right  than 
they  just  the  same." 

"  Here's  a  dragon  that's  a  good  dragon,  Leo, 
lad,"  Terrence  spoke  up.  '  This  dragon  is  going  to 
desert  his  disreputable  companions  and  come  over 
on  your  side  and  be  a  Saint  Terrence.  And  this 
Saint  Terrence  has  a  lovely  question  to  ask  you." 


268  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  Let  this  dragon  roar  first,"  Hancock  inter 
posed.  "  Leo,  by  all  in  love  that  is  sweet  and  lovely, 
I  ask  you:  why  do  lovers,  out  of  jealousy,  so  often 
kill  the  woman  they  love?  " 

"  Because  they  are  hurt,  because  they  are  insane," 
came  the  answer,  "  and  because  they  have  been  un 
fortunate  enough  to  love  a  woman  so  low  in  type 
that  she  could  be  guilty  of  making  them  jealous." 

"  But,  Leo,  love  will  stray,"  Dick  prompted. 
1  You  must  give  a  more  sufficient  answer." 

4  True  for  Dick,"  Terrence  supplemented. 
"  And  it's  helping  you  I  am  to  the  full  stroke  of  your 
sword.  Love  will  stray  among  the  highest  types, 
and  when  it  does  in  steps  the  green-eyed  monster. 
Suppose  the  most  perfect  woman  you  can  imagine 
should  cease  to  love  the  man  who  does  not  beat  her 
and  come  to  love  another  man  who  loves  her  and 
will  not  beat  her  —  what  then?  All  highest  types, 
mind  you.  Now  up  with  your  sword  and  slash  into 
the  dragons." 

"  The  first  man  will  not  kill  her  nor  injure  her  in 
any  way,"  Leo  asserted  stoutly.  "  Because  if  he 
did  he  would  not  be  the  man  you  describe.  He 
would  not  be  high  type,  but  low  type." 

"  You  mean,  he  would  get  out  of  the  way?  "  Dick 
asked,  at  the  same  time  busying  himself  with  a  cigar 
ette  so  that  he  might  glance  at  no  one's  face. 

Leo  nodded  gravely. 

"  He  would  get  out  of  the  way,  and  he  would 
make  the  way  easy  for  her,  and  he  would  be  very 
gentle  with  her." 

"  Let  us  bring  the  argument  right  home,"  Han 
cock  said.  "  We'll  suppose  you're  in  love  with  Mrs. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  269 

Forrest,  and  Mrs.  Forrest  is  in  love  with  you,  and 
you  run  away  together  in  the  big  limousine— 

"  Oh,  but  I  wouldn't,"  the  boy  blurted  out,  his 
cheeks  burning. 

"  Leo,  you  are  not  complimentary,"  Paula  en 
couraged. 

"  It's  just  supposing,  Leo,"  Hancock  urged. 

The  boy's  embarrassment  was  pitiful,  and  his 
voice  quivered,  but  he  turned  bravely  to  Dick  and 
said: 

"  That  is  for  Dick  to  answer." 

"  And  I'll  answer,"  Dick  said.  "  I  wouldn't  kill 
Paula.  Nor  would  I  kill  you,  Leo.  That  wouldn't 
be  playing  the  game.  No  matter  what  I  felt  at 
heart,  I'd  say,  i  Bless  you,  my  children.'  But  just 
the  same  — "  He  paused,  and  the  laughter  signals 
in  the  corners  of  his  eyes  advertised  a  whimsey  — - 
"  I'd  say  to  myself  that  Leo  was  making  a  sad  mis 
take.  You  see,  he  doesn't  know  Paula." 

"  She  would  be  for  interrupting  his  meditations 
on  the  stars,"  Terrence  smiled. 

"  Never,  never,  Leo,  I  promise  you,"  Paula  ex 
claimed. 

"  There  do  you  belie  yourself,  Mrs.  Forrest," 
Terrence  assured  her.  :<  In  the  first  place,  you 
couldn't  help  doing  it.  Besides,  it'd  be  your  bounden 
duty  to  do  it.  And,  finally,  if  I  may  say  so,  as  some 
what  of  an  authority,  when  I  was  a  mad  young  lover 
of  a  man,  with  my  heart  full  of  a  woman  and  my 
eyes  full  of  the  stars,  'twas  ever  the  dearest  delight 
to  be  loved  away  from  them  by  the  woman  out  of  my 
heart." 

"  Terrence,   if  you  keep   on  saying  such  lovely 


27o  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

things, "  cried  Paula,  "  I'll  run  away  with  both  you 
and  Leo  in  the  limousine." 

"  Hurry  the  day,"  said  Terrence  gallantly.  "  But 
leave  space  among  your  fripperies  for  a  few  books 
on  the  stars  that  Leo  and  I  may  be  studying  in  odd 


moments." 


The  combat  ebbed  away  from  Leo,  and  Dar 
Hyal  and  Hancock  beset  Dick. 

"  What  do  you  mean  by  '  playing  the  game  '  ?  " 
Dar  Hyal  asked. 

"  Just  what  I  said,  just  what  Leo  said,"  Dick 
answered;  and  he  knew  that  Paula's  boredom  and 
nervousness  had  been  banished  for  some  time  and 
that  she  was  listening  with  an  interest  almost  eager. 
"  In  my  way  of  thinking,  and  in  accord  with  my  tem 
perament,  the  most  horrible  spiritual  suffering  I  can 
imagine  would  be  to  kiss  a  woman  who  endured  my 
kiss." 

"  Suppose  she  fooled  you,  say  for  old  sake's  sake, 
or  through  desire  not  to  hurt  you,  or  pity  for  you?  " 
Hancock  propounded. 

"  It  would  be,  to  me,  the  unforgivable  sin,"  came 
Dick's  reply.  "  It  would  not  be  playing  the  game  — 
for  her.  I  cannot  conceive  the  fairness,  nor  the  sat 
isfaction,  of  holding  the  woman  one  loves  a  moment 
longer  than  she  loves  to  be  held.  Leo  is  very  right. 
The  drunken  artisan,  with  his  fists,  may  arouse  and 
keep  love  alive  in  the  breast  of  his  stupid  mate.  But 
the  higher  human  males,  the  males  with  some  shadow 
of  rationality,  some  glimmer  of  spirituality,  cannot 
lay  rough  hands  on  love.  With  Leo,  I  would  make 
the  way  easy  for  the  woman,  and  I  would  be  very 
gentle  with  her." 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  271 

"  Then  what  becomes  of  your  boasted  monogamic 
marriage  institution  of  Western  civilization?"  Dar 
Hyal  asked. 

And  Hancock:  "  You  argue  for  free  love,  then?  " 

"  I  can  only  answer  with  a  hackneyed  truism," 
Dick  said.  "  There  can  be  no  love  that  is  not  free. 
Always,  please,  remember  the  point  of  view  is  that 
of  the  higher  types.  And  the  point  of  view  answers 
you,  Dar.  The  vast  majority  of  individuals  must 
be  held  to  law  and  labor  by  the  monogamic  institu 
tion,  or  by  a  stern,  rigid  marriage  institution  of  some 
sort.  They  are  unfit  for  marriage  freedom  or  love 
freedom.  Freedom  of  love,  for  them,  would  be 
merely  license  of  promiscuity.  Only  such  nations 
have  risen  and  endured  where  God  and  the  State  have 
kept  the  people's  instincts  in  discipline  and  order." 

'  Then  you  don't  believe  in  the  marriage  laws  for 
say  yourself,"  Dar  Hyal  inquired,  "  while  you  do 
believe  in  them  for  other  men?" 

"  I  believe  in  them  for  all  men.     Children,  family, 
career,   society,  the  State  —  all  these  things  make  t 
marriage,  legal  marriage,  imperative.     And  by  the 
same  token  that  is  why  I  believe  in  divorce.     Men, 
all  men,  and  women,  all  women,  are  capable  of  lov 
ing  more  than  once,  of  having  the  old  love  die  and 
of  finding  a  new  love  born.     The  State  cannot  con 
trol  love  any  more  than  can  a  man  or  a  woman. 
When  one  falls  in  love  one  falls  in  love,  and  that's 
all  he  knows   about  it.     There  it  is  —  throbbing,  < 
sighing,  singing,  thrilling  love.     But  the  State  can  / 
control  license." 

"  It  is  a  complicated  free  love  that  you  stand  for," 
Hancock  criticised. 


272  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  True,  and  for  the  reason  that  man,  living  in  so 
ciety,  is  a  most  complicated  animal." 

"  But  there  are  men,  lovers,  who  would  die  at 
the  loss  of  their  loved  one,"  Leo  surprised  the  table 
by  his  initiative.  '  They  would  die  if  she  died,  they 
would  die  —  oh  so  more  quickly  —  if  she  lived  and 
loved  another." 

'  Well,  they'll  have  to  keep  on  dying  as  they  have 
always  died  in  the  past,"  Dick  answered  grimly. 
u  And  no  blame  attaches  anywhere  for  their  deaths. 
We  are  so  made  that  our  hearts  sometimes  stray." 

"  My  heart  would  never  stray,"  Leo  asserted 
proudly,  unaware  that  all  at  the  table  knew  his  secret. 
"  I  could  never  love  twice,  I  know." 

1  True  for  you,  lad,"  Terrence  approved.  "  The 
voice  of  all  true  lovers  is  in  your  throat.  'Tis  the 
absoluteness  of  love  that  is  its  joy  —  how  did 
Shelley  put  it?  —  or  was  it  Keats? —  '  All  a  wonder 
and  a  wild  delight.'  Sure,  a  miserable  skinflint  of 
a  half-baked  lover  would  it  be  that  could  dream 
there  was  aught  in  woman  form  one-thousandth  part 
as  sweet,  as  ravishing  and  enticing,  as  glorious  and 
wonderful  as  his  own  woman  that  he  could  ever  love 
again." 

And  as  they  passed  out  from  the  dining  room, 
Dick,  continuing  the  conversation  with  Dar  Hyal, 
was  wondering  whether  Paula  would  kiss  him  good 
night  or  slip  off  to  bed  from  the  piano.  And  Paula, 
talking  to  Leo  about  his  latest  sonnet  which  he  had 
shown  her,  was  wondering  if  she  could  kiss  Dick, 
and  was  suddenly  greatly  desirous  to  kiss  him,  she 
knew  not  why. 


CHAPTER  XXIII 

THERE  was  little  talk  that  same  evening  after 
dinner.  Paula,  singing  at  the  piano,  discon 
certed  Terrence  in  the  midst  of  an  apostrophe 
on  love.  He  quit  a  phrase  midmost  to  listen  to 
the  something  new  he  heard  in  her  voice,  then  slid 
noiselessly  across  the  room  to  join  Leo  at  full  length 
on  the  bearskin.  Dar  Hyal  and  Hancock  likewise 
abandoned  the  discussion,  each  isolating  himself  in  a 
capacious  chair.  Graham,  seeming  least  attracted, 
browsed  in  a  current  magazine,  but  Dick  observed 
that  he  quickly  ceased  turning  the  pages.  Nor  did 
Dick  fail  to  catch  the  new  note  in  Paula's  voice  and 
to  endeavor  to  sense  its  meaning. 

When  she  finished  the  song  the  three  sages  strove 
to  tell  her  all  at  the  same  time  that  for  once  she  had 
forgotten  herself  and  sung  out  as  they  had  always 
claimed  she  could.  Leo  lay  without  movement  or 
speech,  his  chin  on  his  two  hands,  his  face  trans 
figured. 

"  It's  all  this  talk  on  love,"  Paula  laughed,  "  and 
all  the  lovely  thoughts  Leo  and  Terrence  .  .  .  and 
Dick  have  put  into  my  head." 

Terrence  shook  his  long  mop  of  iron-gray  hair. 

"  Into  your  heart  you'd  be  meaning,"  he  corrected. 
"  'Tis  the  very  heart  and  throat  of  love  that  are 
yours  this  night.  And  for  the  first  time,  dear  lady, 

273 


274  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

have  I  heard  the  full  fair  volume  that  is  yours. 
Never  again  plaint  that  your  voice  is  thin.  Thick 
it  is,  and  round  it  is,  as  a  great  rope,  a  great  golden 
rope  for  the  mooring  of  argosies  in  the  harbors  of 
the  Happy  Isles." 

"  And  for  that  I  shall  sing  you  the  Gloria"  she 
answered,  "  to  celebrate  the  slaying  of  the  dragons 
by  Saint  Leo,  by  Saint  Terrence  .  .  .  and,  of  course, 
by  Saint  Richard." 

Dick,  missing  nothing  of  the  talk,  saved  himself 
from  speech  by  crossing  to  the  concealed  sideboard 
and  mixing  for  himself  a  Scotch  and  soda. 

While  Paula  sang  the  Gloria,  he  sat  on  one  of  the 
couches,  sipping  his  drink  and  remembering  keenly. 
Once  before  he  had  heard  her  sing  like  that  —  in 
Paris,  during  their  swift  courtship,  and  directly  after 
ward,  during  their  honeymoon  on  the  All  Away. 

A  little  later,  using  his  empty  glass  in  silent  in 
vitation  to  Graham,  he  mixed  highballs  for  both  of 
them,  and,  when  Graham  had  finished  his,  suggested 
to  Paula  that  she  and  Graham  sing  the  "  Gypsy 
Trail." 

She  shook  her  head  and  began  Das  Kraut  Ver- 
gessenheit. 

"  She  was  not  a  true  woman,  she  was  a  terrible 
woman,"  the  song's  close  wrung  from  Leo.  "  And 
he  was  a  true  lover.  She  broke  his  heart,  but  still 
he  loved  her.  He  cannot  love  again  because  he  can 
not  forget  his  love  for  her." 

"  And  now,  Red  Cloud,  the  Song  of  the  Acorn," 
Paula  said,  smiling  over  to  her  husband.  "  Put 
down  your  glass,  and  be  good,  and  plant  the  acorns." 

Dick  lazily  hauled  himself  off  the  couch  and  stood 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  275 


up,  shaking  his  head  mutinously,  as  if  tossing  a  mane, 
and  stamping  ponderously  with  his  feet  in  simulation 
of  Mountain  Lad. 

"  I'll  have  Leo  know  that  he  is  not  the  only  poet 
and  love-knight  on  the  ranch.  Listen  to  Mountain 
Lad's  song,  all  wonder  and  wild  delight,  Terrence, 
and  more.  Mountain  Lad  doesn't  moon  about  the 
loved  one.  He  doesn't  moon  at  all.  He  incarnates 
love,  and  rears  right  up  in  meeting  and  tells  them 
so.  Listen  to  him!  " 

Dick  filled  the  room  and  shook  the  air  with  wild, 
glad,  stallion  nickering;  and  then,  with  mane-tossing 
and  foot-pawing,  chanted: 

"  Hear  me  !  I  am  Eros !  I  stamp  upon  the  hills. 
I  fill  the  wide  valleys.  The  mares  hear  me,  and 
startle,  in  quiet  pastures;  for  they  know  me.  The 
land  is  filled  with  fatness,  and  the  sap  is  in  the  trees. 
It  is  the  spring.  The  spring  is  mine.  I  am  mon 
arch  of  my  kingdom  of  the  spring.  The  mares  re 
member  my  voice.  They  knew  me  aforetimes 
through  their  mothers  before  them.  Hear  me !  I 
am  Eros.  I  stamp  upon  the  hills,  and  the  wide  val 
leys  are  my  heralds,  echoing  the  sound  of  my  ap 
proach." 

It  was  the  first  time  the  sages  of  the  madrono 
grove  had  h&ard  Dick's  song,  and  they  were  loud  in 
applause.  Hancock  took  it  for  a  fresh  start  in  the 
discussion,  and  was  beginning  to  elaborate  a  biologic 
Bergsonian  definition  of  love,  when  he  was  stopped 
by  Terrence,  who  had  noticed  the  pain  that  swept 
across  Leo's  face. 

"  Go  on,  please,  dear  lady,"  Terrence  begged. 
**  And  sing  of  love,  only  of  love;  for  it  is  my  expe- 


276  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

rience  that  I  meditate  best  upon  the  stars  to  the  ac 
companiment  of  a  woman's  voice." 

A  little  later,  Oh  Joy,  entering  the  room,  waited 
till  Paula  finished  a  song,  then  moved  noiselessly  to 
Graham  and  handed  him  a  telegram.  Dick  scowled 
at  the  interruption. 

"Very  important  —  I  think,"  the  Chinese  ex 
plained  to  him. 

;t  Who  took  it?"  Dick  demanded. 

"  Me  —  I  took  it,"  was  the  answer.  "  Night 
clerk  at  Eldorado  call  on  telephone.  He  say  im 
portant.  I  take  it." 

"  It  is,  fairly  so,"  Graham  spoke  up,  having 
finished  reading  the  message.  "  Can  I  get  a  train 
out  to-night  for  San  Francisco,  Dick?" 

"  Oh  Joy,  come  back  a  moment,"  Dick  called, 
looking  at  his  watch.  '  What  train  for  San  Fran 
cisco  stops  at  Eldorado?" 

"  Eleven-ten,"  came  the  instant  information. 
"  Plenty  time.  Not  too  much.  I  call  chauffeur?  " 

Dick  nodded. 

"  You  really  must  jump  out  to-night?"  he  asked 
Graham. 

"  Really.  It  is  quite  important.  Will  I  have 
time  to  pack?  " 

Dick  gave  a  confirmatory  nod  to  Oh  Joy,  and  said 
to  Graham: 

"  Just  time  to  throw  the  needful  into  a  grip."  He 
turned  to  Oh  Joy.  "  Is  Oh  My  up  yet?  " 

"  Yessr." 

"  Send  him  to  Mr.  Graham's  room  to  help,  and 
let  me  know  as  soon  as  the  machine  is  ready.  No 
limousine.  Tell  Saunders  to  take  the  racer." 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  277 

"  One  fine  big  strapping  man,  that,"  Terrence 
commented,  after  Graham  had  left  the  room. 

They  had  gathered  about  Dick,  with  the  exception 
of  Paula,  who  remained  at  the  piano,  listening. 

"  One  of  the  few  men  I'd  care  to  go  along  with, 
hell  for  leather,  on  a  forlorn  hope  or  anything  of 
that  sort,7'  Dick  said.  "  He  was  on  the  Nethermere 
when  she  went  ashore  at  Pango  in  the  '97  hurricane. 
Pango  is  just  a  strip  of  sand,  twelve  feet  above  high 
water  mark,  a  lot  of  cocoanuts,  and  uninhabited. 
Forty  women  among  the  passengers,  English  officers' 
wives  and  such.  Graham  had  a  bad  arm,  big  as  a 
leg  —  snake  bite. 

"  It  was  a  thundering  sea.  Boats  couldn't  live. 
They  smashed  two  and  lost  both  crews.  Four  sail 
ors  volunteered  in  succession  to  carry  a  light  line 
ashore.  And  each  man,  in  turn,  dead  at  the  end  of 
it,  was  hauled  back  on  board.  While  they  were  un 
tying  the  last  one,  Graham,  with  an  arm  like  a  leg, 
stripped  for  it  and  went  to  it.  And  he  did  it,  al 
though  the  pounding  he  got  on  the  sand  broke  his 
bad  arm  and  staved  in  three  ribs.  But  he  made  the 
line  fast  before  he  quit.  In  order  to  haul  the  haw 
ser  ashore,  six  more  volunteered  to  go  in  on  Evan's 
line  to  the  beach.  Four  of  them  arrived.  And  only 
one  woman  of  the  forty  was  lost  —  she  died  of  heart 
disease  and  fright. 

"  I  asked  him  about  it  once.  He  was  as  bad  as  an 
Englishman.  All  I  could  get  out  of  the  beggar  was 
that  the  recovery  was  uneventful.  Thought  that  the 
salt  water,  the  exercise,  and  the  breaking  of  the 
bone  had  served  as  counter-irritants  and  done  the 
arm  good." 


278  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

Oh  Joy  and  Graham  entered  the  room  from  op 
posite  ends.  Dick  saw  that  Graham's  first  questing 
glance  was  for  Paula. 

"  All  ready,  sir,"  Oh  Joy  announced. 

Dick  prepared  to  accompany  his  guest  outside  to 
the  car ;  but  Paula  evidenced  her  intention  of  remain 
ing  in  the  house.  Graham  started  over  to  her  to 
murmur  perfunctory  regrets  and  good-by. 

And  she,  warm  with  what  Dick  had  just  told  of 
him,  pleasured  at  the  goodly  sight  of  him,  dwelling 
with  her  eyes  on  the  light,  high  poise  of  head,  the 
careless,  sun-sanded  hair,  and  the  lightness,  almost 
debonaireness,  of  his  carriage  despite  his  weight  of 
body  and  breadth  of  shoulders.  As  he  drew  near 
to  her,  she  centered  her  gaze  on  the  long  gray  eyes 
whose  hint  of  drooping  lids  hinted  of  boyish  sullen- 
ness.  She  waited  for  the  expression  of  sullenness 
to  vanish  as  the  eyes  lighted  with  the  smile  she  had 
come  to  know  so  well. 

What  he  said  was  ordinary  enough,  as  were  her 
regrets;  but  in  his  eyes,  as  he  held  her  hand  a  mo 
ment,  was  the  significance  which  she  had  uncon 
sciously  expected  and  to  which  she  replied  with  her 
own  eyes.  The  same  significance  was  in  the  pressure 
of  the  momentary  handclasp.  All  unpremeditated, 
she  responded  to  that  quick  pressure.  As  he  had 
said,  there  was  little  need  for  speech  between  them. 

As  their  hands  fell  apart,  she  glanced  swiftly  at 
Dick;  for  she  had  learned  much,  in  their  dozen  years 
together,  of  his  flashes  of  observance,  and  had  come 
to  stand  in  awe  of  his  almost  uncanny  powers  of 
guessing  facts  from  nuances,  and  of  linking  nuances 
into  conclusions  often  startling  in  their  thorough- 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  279 

ness  and  correctness.  But  Dick,  his  shoulder  to 
ward  her,  laughing  over  some  quip  of  Hancock,  was 
just  turning  his  laughter-crinkled  eyes  toward  her  as 
he  started  to  accompany  Graham. 

No,  was  her  thought;  surely  Dick  had  seen  noth 
ing  of  the  secret  little  that  had  been  exchanged  be 
tween  them.  It  had  been  very  little,  very  quick  —  a 
light  in  the  eyes,  a  muscular  quiver  of  the  fingers, 
and  no  lingering.  How  could  Dick  have  seen  or 
sensed?  Their  eyes  had  certainly  been  hidden  from 
Dick,  likewise  their  clasped  hands,  for  Graham's 
back  had  been  toward  him. 

Just  the  same,  she  wished  she  had  not  made  that 
swift  glance  at  Dick.  She  was  conscious  of  a  feel 
ing  of  guilt,  and  the  thought  of  it  hurt  her  as  she 
watched  the  two  big  men,  of  a  size  and  blondness, 
go  down  the  room  side  by  side.  Of  what  had  she 
been  guilty?  she  asked  herself.  Why  should  she 
have  anything  to  hide  ?  Yet  she  was  honest  enough 
to  face  the  fact  and  accept,  without  quibble,  that  she 
had  something  to  hide.  And  her  cheeks  burned  at  the 
thought  that  she  was  being  drifted  into  deception. 

"  I  won't  be  but  a  couple  of  days,"  Graham  was 
saying  as  he  shook  hands  with  Dick  at  the  car. 

Dick  saw  the  square,  straight  look  of  his  eyes, 
and  recognized  the  firmness  and  heartiness  of  his 
gripping  hand.  Graham  half  began  to  say  some 
thing,  tbten  did  not;  and  Dick  knew  he  had  changed 
his  mind  when  he  said: 

"  I  think,  when  I  get  back,  that  I'll  have  to  pack." 

"  But  the  book,"  Dick  protested,  inwardly  curs 
ing  himself  for  the  leap  of  joy  which  had  been  his  at 
the  other's  words. 


280  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  That's  just  why,"  Graham  answered.  "  I've 
got  to  get  it  finished.  It  doesn't  seem  I  can  work 
like  you  do.  The  ranch  is  too  alluring.  I  can't  get 
down  to  the  book.  I  sit  over  it,  and  sit  over  it,  but 
the  confounded  meadowlarks  keep  echoing  in  my 
ears,  and  I  begin  to  see  the  fields,  and  the  redwood 
canyons,  and  Selim.  And  after  I  waste  an  hour,  I 
give  up  and  ring  for  Selim.  And  if  it  isn't  that,  it's 
any  one  of  a  thousand  other  enchantments." 

He  put  his  foot  on  the  running-board  of  the  puls 
ing  car  and  said,  "  Well,  so  long,  old  man." 

"  Come  back  and  make  a  stab  at  it,"  urged  Dick. 
"  If  necessary,  we'll  frame  up  a  respectable  daily 
grind,  and  I'll  lock  you  in  every  morning  until  you've 
done  it.  And  if  you  don't  do  your  work  all  day,  all 
day  you'll  stay  locked  in.  I'll  make  you  work. — 
Got  cigarettes?  —  matches?  " 

"  Right  O." 

"  Let  her  go,  Saunders,"  Dick  ordered  the  chauf 
feur;  and  the  car  seemed  to  leap  out  into  the  dark 
ness  from  the  brilliantly  lighted  porte  cochere. 

Back  in  the  house,  Dick  found  Paula  playing  to 
the  madrono  sages,  and  ensconced  himself  on  the 
couch  to  wait  and  wonder  if  she  would  kiss  him  good 
night  when  bedtime  came.  It  was  not,  he  recog 
nized,  as  if  they  made  a  regular  schedule  of  kissing. 
It  had  never  been  like  that.  Often  and  often  he 
did  not  see  her  until  midday,  and  then  in  the  pres 
ence  of  guests.  And  often  and  often,  she  slipped 
away  to  bed  early,  disturbing  no  one  with  a  good 
night  kiss  to  her  husband  which  might  well  hint  to 
them  that  their  bedtime  had  come. 

No,  Dick  concluded,  whether  or  not  she  kissed  him 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  281 

on  this  particular  night  it  would  be  equally  without 
significance.  But  still  he  wondered. 

She  played  on  and  sang  on  interminably,  until  at 
last  he  fell  asleep.  When  he  awoke  he  was  alone  in 
the  room.  Paula  and  the  sages  had  gone  out 
quietly.  He  looked  at  his  watch.  It  marked  one 
o'clock.  She  had  played  unusually  late,  he  knew; 
for  he  knew  she  had  just  gone.  It  was  the  cessa 
tion  of  music  and  movement  that  had  awakened  him. 

And  still  he  wondered.  Often  he  napped  there  to 
her  playing,  and  always,  when  she  had  finished,  she 
kissed  him  awake  and  sent  him  to  bed.  But  this 
night  she  had  not.  Perhaps,  after  all,  she  was  com 
ing  back.  He  lay  and  drowsed  and  waited.  The 
next  time  he  looked  at  his  watch,  it  was  two  o'clock. 
She  had  not  come  back. 

He  turned  off  the  lights,  and  as  he  crossed  the 
house,  pressed  off  the  hall  lights  as  he  went,  while 
the  many  unimportant  little  nothings,  almost  of 
themselves,  ranged  themselves  into  an  ordered  text 
of  doubt  and  conjecture  that  he  could  not  refrain 
from  reading. 

On  his  sleeping  porch,  glancing  at  his  barometers 
and  thermometers,  her  laughing  face  in  the  round 
frame  caught  his  eyes,  and,  standing  before  it,  even 
bending  closer  to  it,  he  studied  her  long. 

"  Oh,  well,"  he  muttered,  as  he  drew  up  the  bed 
covers,  propped  the  pillows  behind  him  and  reached 
for  a  stack  of  proof  sheets,  "  whatever  it  is  I'll  have 
to  play  it." 

He  looked  sidewise  at  her  picture. 

"  But,  oh,  Little  Woman,  I  wish  you  wouldn't," 
was  the  sighed  good  night. 


CHAPTER  XXIV 

AS  luck  would  have  it,  beyond  chance  guests  for 
lunch  or  dinner,  the  Big  House  was  empty. 
In  vain,  on  the  first  and  second  days,  did  Dick 
lay  out  his  work,  or  defer  it,  so  as  to  be  ready  for 
any  suggestion  from  Paula  to  go  for  an  afternoon 
swim  or  drive. 

He  noted  that  she  managed  always  to  avoid  the 
possibility  of  being  kissed.  From  her  sleeping 
porch  she  called  good  night  to  him  across  the  wide 
patio.  In  the  morning  he  prepared  himself  for  her 
eleven  o'clock  greeting.  Mr.  Agar  and  Mr.  Pitts, 
with  important  matters  concerning  the  forthcoming 
ranch  sale  of  stock  still  unsettled,  Dick  promptly 
cleared  out  at  the  stroke  of  eleven.  Up  she  was, 
he  knew,  for  he  had  heard  her  singing.  As  he 
waited,  seated  at  his  desk,  for  once  he  was  idle.  A 
tray  of  letters  before  him  continued  to  need  his  sig 
nature.  He  remembered  this  morning  pilgrimage 
of  hers  had  been  originated  by  her,  and  by  her, 
somewhat  persistently,  had  been  kept  up.  And  an 
adorable  thing  it  was,  he  decided  —  that  soft  call  of 
"  Good  morning,  merry  gentleman,"  and  the  folding 
of  her  kimono-clad  figure  in  his  arms. 

He  remembered,  further,  that  he  had  often  cut 
that  little  visit  short,  conveying  the  impression  to 
her,  even  while  he  clasped  her,  of  how  busy  he  was. 
And  he  remembered,  more  than  once,  the  certain 

282 


THE  LITTLE  LADY  283 

little  wistful  shadow  on  her  face  as  she  slipped  away. 

Quarter  past  eleven,  and  she  had  not  come.  He 
took  down  the  receiver  to  telephone  the  dairy,  and 
in  the  swift  rush  of  women's  conversation,  ere  he 
hung  up,  he  caught  Paula's  voice : 

"—  Bother  Mr.  Wade.  Bring  all  the  little 
Wades  and  come,  if  only  for  a  couple  of  days  — " 

Which  was  very  strange  of  Paula.  She  had  in 
variably  welcomed  the  intervals  of  no  guests,  when 
she  and  he  were  left  alone  with  each  other  for  a 
day  or  for  several  days.  And  now  she  was  trying 
to  persuade  Mrs.  Wade  to  come  down  from  Sacra 
mento.  It  would  seem  that  Paula  did  not  wish  to 
be  alone  with  him,  and  was  seeking  to  protect  her 
self  with  company. 

He  smiled  as  he  realized  that  that  morning  em 
brace,  now  that  it  was  not  tendered  him,  had  become 
suddenly  desirable.  The  thought  came  to  him  of 
taking  her  away  with  him  on  one  of  their  travel- 
jaunts.  That  would  solve  the  problem,  perhaps. 
And  he  would  hold  her  very  close  to  him  and  draw 
her  closer.  Why  not  an  Alaskan  hunting  trip  ?  She 
had  always  wanted  to  go.  Or  back  to  their  old  sail 
ing  grounds  in  the  days  of  the  All  Away  —  the  South 
Seas.  Steamers  ran  direct  between  San  Francisco 
and  Tahiti.  In  twelve  days  they  could  be  ashore 
in  Papeete.  He  wondered  if  Lavaina  still  ran  her 
boarding  house,  and  his  quick  vision  caught  a  picture 
of  Paula  and  himself  at  breakfast  on  Lavaina's 
porch  In  the  shade  of  the  mango  trees. 

He  brought  his  fist  down  on  the  desk.  No,  by 
God,  he  was  no  coward  to  run  away  with  his  wife 
for  fear  of  any  man.  And  would  it  be  fair  to  her 


284  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

to  take  her  away  possibly  from  where  her  desire 
lay?  True,  he  did  not  know  where  her  desire  lay, 
nor  how  far  it  had  gone  between  her  and  Graham. 
Might  it  not  be  a  spring  madness  with  her  that  would 
vanish  with  the  spring?  Unfortunately,  he  decided, 
in  the  dozen  years  of  their  marriage  she  had  never 
evidenced  any  predisposition  toward  spring  madness. 
She  had  never  given  his  heart  a  moment's  doubt. 
Herself  tremendously  attractive  to  men,  seeing  much 
of  them,  receiving  their  admiration  and  even  court, 
she  had  remained  always  her  equable  and  serene  self, 
Dick  Forrest's  wife  — 

"  Good  morning,  merry  gentleman." 

She  was  peeping  in  on  him,  quite  naturally  from 
the  hall,  her  eyes  and  lips  smiling  to  him,  blowing 
him  a  kiss  from  her  finger  tips. 

"  And  good  morning,  my  little  haughty  moon,"  he 
called  back,  himself  equally  his  natural  self. 

And  now  she  would  come  in,  he  thought;  and  he 
would  fold  her  in  his  arms,  and  put  her  to  the  test 
of  the  kiss. 

He  opened  his  arms  in  invitation.  But  she  did 
not  enter.  Instead,  she  startled,  with  one  hand 
gathered  her  kimono  at  her  breast,  with  the 
other  picked  up  the  trailing  skirt  as  if  for  flight, 
at  the  same  time  looking  apprehensively  down  the 
hall.  Yet  his  keen  ears  had  caught  no  sound.  She 
smiled  back  at  him,  blew  him  another  kiss,  and  was 
gone. 

Ten  minutes  later  he  had  no  ears  for  Bonbright, 
who,  telegrams  in  hand,  startled  him  as  he  sat  mo 
tionless  at  his  desk,  as  he  had  sat,  without  move 
ment,  for  ten  minutes. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  285 

And  yet  she  was  happy.  Dick  knew  her  too  long 
in  all  the  expressions  of  her  moods  not  to  realize  the 
significance  of  her  singing  over  the  house,  in  the 
arcades,  and  out  in  the  patio.  He  did  not  leave  his 
workroom  till  the  stroke  of  lunch ;  nor  did  she,  as  she 
sometimes  did,  come  to  gather  him  up  on  the  way. 
At  the  lunch  gong,  from  across  the  patio,  he  heard 
her  trilling  die  away  into  the  house  in  the  direction 
of  the  dining  room. 

A  Colonel  Harrison  Stoddard  —  colonel  from 
younger  service  in  the  National  Guard,  himself  a 
retired  merchant  prince  whose  hobby  was  industrial 
relations  and  social  unrest  —  held  the  table  most  of 
the  meal  upon  the  extension  of  the  Employers'  Lia 
bility  Act  so  as  to  include  agricultural  laborers.  But 
Paula  found  a  space  in  which  casually  to  give  the 
news  to  Dick  that  she  was  running  away  for  the 
afternoon  on  a  jaunt  up  to  Wickenberg  to  the 
Masons. 

"  Of  course  I  don't  know  when  I'll  be  back  — 
you  know  what  the  Masons  are.  And  I  don't  dare 
ask  you  to  come,  though  I'd  like  you  along." 

Dick  shook  his  head. 

"  And  so,"  she  continued,  "  if  you're  not  using 
Saunders  — " 

Dick  nodded  acquiescence. 

"  I'm  using  Callahan  this  afternoon,"  he  ex 
plained,  on  the  instant  planning  his  own  time  now 
that  Paula  was  out  of  the  question.  "  I  never  can 
make  out,  Paul,  why  you  prefer  Saunders.  Calla 
han  is  the  better  driver,  and  of  course  the  safest." 

"  Perhaps  that's  why,"  she  said  with  a  smile. 
"  Safety  first  means  slowest  most." 


286  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  Just  the  same  I'd  back  Callahan  against  Saunders 
on  a  speed-track,"  Dick  championed. 

"  Where  are  you  bound?  "  she  asked. 

"  Oh,  to  show  Colonel  Stoddard  my  one-man  and 
no-horse  farm  —  you  know,  the  automatically  cul 
tivated  ten-acre  stunt  I've  been  frivoling  with.  A  lot 
of  changes  have  been  made  that  have  been  waiting  a 
week  for  me  to  see  tried  out.  I've  been  too  busy. 
And  after  that,  I'm  going  to  take  him  over  the  colony 
—  what  do  you  think?  —  five  additions  the  last 
week." 

"  I  thought  the  membership  was  full,"  Paula  said. 

"  It  was,  and  still  is,"  Dick  beamed.  "But  these 
are  babies.  And  the  least  hopeful  of  the  families 
had  the  rashness  to  have  twins." 

"  A  lot  of  wiseacres  are  shaking  their  heads  over 
that  experiment  of  yours,  and  I  make  free  to  say 
that  I  am  merely  holding  my  judgment  —  you've  got 
to  show  me  by  bookkeeping,"  Colonel  Stoddard  was 
saying,  immensely  pleased  at  the  invitation  to  be 
shown  over  in  person. 

Dick  scarcely  heard  him,  such  was  the  rush  of 
other  thoughts.  Paula  had  not  mentioned  whether 
Mrs.  Wade  and  the  little  Wades  were  coming,  much 
less  mentioned  that  she  had  invited  them.  Yet  this 
Dick  tried  to  consider  no  lapse  on  her  part,  for  often 
and  often,  like  himself,  she  had  guests  whose  arrival 
was  the  first  he  knew  of  their  coming. 

It  was,  however,  evident  that  Mrs.  Wade  was  not 
coming  that  day,  else  Paula  would  not  be  running 
away  thirty  miles  up  the  valley.  That  was  it,  and 
there  was  no  bli»king  it.  She  was  running  away,  and 
from  him.  She  could  not  face  being  alone  with 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  287 

him  with  the  consequent  perils  of  intimacy  —  and 
perilous,  in  such  circumstances,  could  have  but  the 
significance  he  feared.  And  further,  she  was  making 
the  evening  sure.  She  would  not  be  back  for  dinner, 
or  till  long  after  dinner,  it  was  a  safe  wager,  unless 
she  brought  the  whole  Wickenberg  crowd  with  her. 
She  would  be  back  late  enough  to  expect  him  to 
be  in  bed.  Well,  he  would  not  disappoint  her, 
he  decided  grimly,  as  he  replied  to  Colonel  Stod- 
dard: 

'  The  experiment  works  out  splendidly  on  paper, 
with  decently  wide  margins  for  human  nature.  And 
there  I  admit  is  the  doubt  and  the  danger  —  the 
human  nature.  But  the  only  way  to  test  it  is  to  test 
it,  which  is  what  I  am  doing." 

"  It  won't  be  the  first  Dick  has  charged  to  profit 
and  loss,"  Paula  said. 

"  But  five  thousand  acres,  all  the  working  capital 
for  two  hundred  and  fifty  farmers,  and  a  cash  salary 
of  a  thousand  dollars  each  a  year!  "  Colonel  Stod- 
dard  protested.  "  A  few  such  failures  —  if  it  fails 
—  would  put  a  heavy  drain  on  the  Harvest." 

"  That's  what  the  Harvest  needs,"  Dick  answered 
lightly. 

Colonel  Stoddard  looked  blank. 

"  Precisely,"  Dick  confirmed.  "  Drainage,  you 
know.  The  mines  are  flooded  —  the  Mexican  situa 


tion." 


It  was  during  the  morning  of  the  second  day  — 
the  day  of  Graham's  expected  return  —  that  Dick, 
who,  by  being  on  horseback  at  eleven,  had  avoided  a 
repetition  of  the  hurt  of  the  previous  day's  "  Good 


288  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

morning,  merry  gentleman  "  across  the  distance  of 
his  workroom,  encountered  Ah  Ha  in  a  hall  with  an 
armful  of  fresh-cut  lilacs.  The  house-boy's  way  led 
toward  the  tower  room,  but  Dick  made  sure. 

'  Where  are  you  taking  them,  Ah  Ha  ?  "  he  asked. 

"  Mr.  Graham's  room  —  he  come  to-day." 

Now  whose  thought  was  that?  Dick  pondered. 
Ah  Ha's  ?  —  Oh  Joy's  —  or  Paula's  ?  He  remem 
bered  having  heard  Graham  more  than  once  express 
his  fancy  for  their  lilacs. 

He  deflected  his  course  from  the  library  and 
strolled  out  through  the  flowers  near  the  tower  room. 
Through  the  open  windows  of  it  came  Paula's  happy 
humming.  Dick  pressed  his  lower  lip  with  tight 
quickness  between  his  teeth  and  strolled  on. 

Some  great,  as  well  as  many  admirable,  men  and 
women  had  occupied  that  room,  and  for  them  Paula 
had  never  supervised  the  flower  arrangement,  Dick 
meditated.  Oh  Joy,  himself  a  master  of  flowers, 
usually  attended  to  that,  or  had  his  house-staff  ably 
drilled  to  do  it. 

Among  the  telegrams  Bonbright  handed  him,  was 
one  from  Graham,  which  Dick  read  twice,  although 
it  was  simple  and  unmomentous,  being  merely  a  post 
ponement  of  his  return. 

Contrary  to  custom,  Dick  did  not  wait  for  the  sec 
ond  lunch-gong.  At  the  sound  of  the  first  he  started, 
for  he  felt  the  desire  for  one  of  Oh  Joy's  cocktails  — 
the  need  of  a  prod  of  courage,  after  the  lilacs,  to 
meet  Paula.  But  she  was  ahead  of  him.  He  found 
her  —  who  rarely  drank,  and  never  alone  —  just 
placing  an  empty  cocktail  glass  back  on  the  tray. 

So  she,  too,  had  needed  courage  for  the  meal,  was 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  289 

his  deduction,  as  he  nodded  to  Oh  Joy  and  held  up 
one  finger. 

"  Caught  you  at  it!  "  he  reproved  gaily.  "  Secret 
tippling.  The  gravest  of  symptoms.  Little  I 
thought,  the  day  I  stood  up  with  you,  that  the  wife 
I  was  marrying  was  doomed  to  fill  an  alcoholic's 
grave." 

Before  she  could  retort,  a  young  man  strolled  in 
whom  she  and  Dick  greeted  as  Mr.  Winters,  and 
who  also  must  have  a  cocktail.  Dick  tried  to  believe 
that  it  was  not  relief  he  sensed  in  Paula's  manner 
as  she  greeted  the  newcomer.  He  had  never  seen 
her  quite  so  cordial  to  him  before,  although  often 
enough  she  had  met  him.  At  any  rate,  there  would 
be  three  at  lunch. 

Mr.  Winters,  an  agricultural  college  graduate  and 
special  writer  for  the  Pacific  Rural  Press,  as  well 
as  a  sort  of  protege  of  Dick,  had  come  for  data 
for  an  article  on  California  fish-ponds,  and  Dick 
mentally  arranged  his  afternoon's  program  for  him. 

"  Got  a  telegram  from  Evan,"  he  told  Paula. 
"  Won't  be  back  till  the  four  o'clock  day  after  to 


morrow." 


"  And  after  all  my  trouble !  "  she  exclaimed. 
"  Now  the  lilacs  will  be  wilted  and  spoiled." 

Dick  felt  a  warm  glow  of  pleasure.  There  spoke 
his  frank,  straightforward  Paula.  No  matter  what 
the  game  was,  or  its  outcome,  at  least  she  would  play 
it  without  the  petty  deceptions.  She  had  always 
been  that  way  —  too  transparent  to  make  a  success 
of  deceit. 

Nevertheless,  he  played  his  own  part  by  a  glance 
of  scarcely  interested  interrogation. 


290  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  Why,  in  Graham's  room,"  she  explained.  "  I 
had  the  boys  bring  a  big  armful  and  I  arranged  them 
all  myself.  He's  so  fond  of  them,  you  know." 

Up  to  the  end  of  lunch,  she  had  made  no  mention 
of  Mrs.  Wade's  coming,  and  Dick  knew  definitely 
she  was  not  coming  when  Paula  queried  casually: 

"  Expecting  anybody?  " 

He  shook  his  head,  and  asked,  "  Are  you  doing 
anything  this  afternoon?" 

"  Haven't  thought  about  anything,"  she  answered. 
"  And  now  I  suppose  I  can't  plan  upon  you  with  Mr. 
Winters  to  be  told  all  about  fish." 

"  But  you  can,"  Dick  assured  her.  "  I'm  turning 
him  over  to  Mr.  Hanley,  who's  got  the  trout  counted 
down  to  the  last  egg  hatched  and  who  knows  all  the 
grandfather  bass  by  name.  I'll  tell  you  what — " 
He  paused  and  considered.  Then  his  face  lighted 
as  with  a  sudden  idea.  "  It's  a  loafing  afternoon. 
Let's  take  the  rifles  and  go  potting  squirrels.  I  no 
ticed  the  other  day  they've  become  populous  on  that 
hill  above  the  Little  Meadow." 

But  he  had  not  failed  to  observe  the  flutter  of 
alarm  that  shadowed  her  eyes  so  swiftly,  and  that 
so  swiftly  was  gone  as  she  clapped  her  hands  and 
was  herself. 

"  But  don't  take  a  rifle  for  me,"  she  said. 

"  If  you'd  rather  not — "  he  began  gently. 

"  Oh,  I  want  to  go,  but  I  don't  feel  up  to  shoot 
ing.  I'll  take  Le  Gallienne's  last  book  along  —  it 
just  came  in  —  and  read  to  you  in  betweenwhiles. 
Remember,  the  last  time  I  did  that  when  we  went 
squirreling  it  was  his  '  Quest  of  the  Golden  Girl ' 
I  read  to  you." 


CHAPTER  XXV 

PAULA  on  the  Fawn,  and  Dick  on  the  Outlaw, 
rode  out  from  the  Big  House  as  nearly  side 
by  side  as  the  Outlaw's  wicked  perversity  per 
mitted.  The  conversation  she  permitted  was  frag 
mentary.  With  tiny  ears  laid  back  and  teeth  ex 
posed,  she  would  attempt  to  evade  Dick's  restraint 
of  rein  and  spur  and  win  to  a  bite  of  Paula's  leg  or 
the  Fawn's  sleek  flank,  and  with  every  defeat  the 
pink  flushed  and  faded  in  the  whites  of  her  eyes. 
Her  restless  head-tossing  and  pitching  attempts  to 
rear  (thwarted  by  the  martingale)  never  ceased, 
save  when  she  pranced  and  sidled  and  tried  to  whirl. 

"  This  is  the  last  year  of  her,"  Dick  announced. 
"  She's  indomitable.  I've  worked  two  years  on  her 
without  the  slightest  improvement.  She  knows  me, 
knows  my  ways,  knows  I  am  her  master,  knows 
when  she  has  to  give  in,  but  is  never  satisfied.  She 
nourishes  the  perennial  hope  that  some  time  she'll 
catch  me  napping,  and  for  fear  she'll  miss  that  time 
she  never  lets  any  time  go  by." 

"  And  some  time  she  may  catch  you,"  Paula  said. 

"  That's  why  I'm  giving  her  up.  It  isn't  exactly 
a  strain  on  me,  but  soon  or  late  she's  bound  to  get  me 
if  there's  anything  in  the  law  of  probability.  It  may 
be  a  million-to-one  shot,  but  heaven  alone  knows 
where  in  the  series  of  the  million  that  fatal  one  is  go 
ing  to  pop  up." 

291 


292  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  You're  a  wonder,  Red  Cloud,"  Paula  smiled. 

"Why?" 

*  You  think  in  statistics  and  percentages,  averages 
and  exceptions.  I  wonder,  when  we  first  met,  what 
particular  formula  you  measured  me  up  by." 

"I'll  be  darned  if  I  did,"  he  laughed  back. 
1  There  was  where  all  signs  failed.  I  didn't  have  a 
statistic  that  applied  to  you.  I  merely  acknowledged 
to  myself  that  here  was  the  most  wonderful  female 
woman  ever  born  with  two  good  legs,  and  I  knew 
that  I  wanted  her  more  than  I  had  ever  wanted  any 
thing.  I  just  had  to  have  her  — " 

"  And  got  her,"  Paula  completed  for  him.  "  But 
since,  Red  Cloud,  since.  Surely  you've  accumulated 
enough  statistics  on  me." 

"  A  few,  quite  a  few,"  he  admitted.  "  But  I 
hope  never  to  get  the  last  one  — " 

He  broke  off  at  sound  of  the  unmistakable  nicker 
of  Mountain  Lad.  The  stallion  appeared,  the  cow 
boy  on  his  back,  and  Dick  gazed  for  a  moment  at  the 
perfect  action  of  the  beast's  great  swinging  trot. 

"  We've  got  to  get  out  of  this,"  he  warned,  as 
Mountain  Lad,  at  sight  of  them,  broke  into  a  gallop. 

Together  they  pricked  their  mares,  whirled  them 
about,  and  fled,  while  from  behind  they  heard  the 
soothing  "  Whoas  "  of  the  rider,  the  thuds  of  the 
heavy  hoofs  on  the  roadway,  and  a  wild  imperative 
neigh.  The  Outlaw  answered,  and  the  Fawn  was 
but  a  moment  behind  her.  From  the  commotion 
they  knew  Mountain  Lad  was  getting  tempestuous. 

Leaning  to  the  curve,  they  swept  into  a  cross-road 
and  in  fifty  paces  pulled  up,  where  they  waited  till 
the  danger  was  past. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  293 

"  He's  never  really  injured  anybody  yet,"  Paula 
said,  as  they  started  back. 

"  Except  when  he  casually  stepped  on  Cowley's 
toes.  You  remember  he  was  laid  up  in  bed  for  a 
month,"  Dick  reminded  her,  straightening  out  the 
Outlaw  from  a  sidle  and  with  a  flicker  of  glance 
catching  the  strange  look  with  which  Paula  was  re 
garding  him. 

There  was  question  in  it,  he  could  see,  and  love  in 
it,  and  fear  —  yes,  almost  fear,  or  at  least  appre 
hension  that  bordered  on  dismay;  but,  most  of  all, 
a  seeking,  a  searching,  a  questioning.  Not  entirely 
ungermane  to  her  mood,  was  his  thought,  had  been 
that  remark  of  his  thinking  in  statistics. 

But  he  made  that  he  had  not  seen,  whipping  out 
his  pad,  and,  with  an  interested  glance  at  a  culvert 
they  were  passing,  making  a  note. 

"  They  missed  it,"  he  said.  "  It  should  have  been 
repaired  a  month  ago." 

"  What  has  become  of  all  those  Nevada  mus 
tangs?"  Paula  inquired. 

This  was  a  flyer  Dick  had  taken,  when  a  bad  sea 
son  for  Nevada  pasture  had  caused  mustangs  to  sell 
for  a  song  with  the  alternative  of  starving  to  death. 
He  had  shipped  a  trainload  down  and  ranged  them 
in  his  wilder  mountain  pastures  to  the  west. 

"  It's  time  to  break  them,"  he  answered.  "  And 
I'm  thinking  of  a  real  old-fashioned  rodeo  next  week. 
What  do  you  say?  Have  a  barbecue  and  all  the 
rest,  and  invite  the  country  side?  ' 

"  And  then  you  won't  be  there,"  Paula  objected. 

"  I'll  take  a  day  off.     Is  it  a  go?" 

They  reined  to  one  side  of  the  road,  as  she  agreed, 


294  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

to  pass  three  farm  tractors,  all  with  their  trailage 
of  ganged  discs  and  harrows. 

"  Moving  them  across  to  the  Rolling  Meadows," 
he  explained.  "  They  pay  over  horses  on  the  right 
ground." 

Rising  from  the  home  valley,  passing  through  cul 
tivated  fields  and  wooded  knolls,  they  took  a  road 
busy  with  many  wagons  hauling  road-dressing  from 
the  rock-crusher  they  could  hear  growling  and 
crunching  higher  up. 

"  Needs  more  exercise  than  I've  been  giving  her," 
Dick  remarked,  jerking  the  Outlaw's  bared  teeth 
away  from  dangerous  proximity  to  the  Fawn's  flank. 

"  And  it's  disgraceful  the  way  I've  neglected 
Duddy  and  Fuddy,"  Paula  said.  "I've  kept  their 
feed  down  like  a  miser,  but  they're  a  lively  handful 
just  the  same." 

Dick  heard  her  idly,  but  within  forty-eight  hours 
he  was  to  remember  with  hurt  what  she  had  said. 

They  continued  on  till  the  crunch  of  the  rock- 
crusher  died  away,  penetrated  a  belt  of  woodland, 
crossed  a  tiny  divide  where  the  afternoon  sunshine 
was  wine-colored  by  the  manzanita  and  rose-colored 
by  madronos,  and  dipped  down  through  a  young 
planting  of  eucalyptus  to  the  Little  Meadow.  But 
before  they  reached  it,  they  dismounted  and  tied 
their  horses.  Dick  took  the  .22  automatic  rifle  from 
his  saddle-holster,  and  with  Paula  advanced  softly 
to  a  clump  of  redwoods  on  the  edge  of  the  meadow. 
They  disposed  themselves  in  the  shade  and  gazed 
out  across  the  meadow  to  the  steep  slope  of  hill  that 
came  down  to  it  a  hundred  and  fifty  yards  away. 

"  There    they    are  —  three  —  four    of    them," 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  295 

Paula  whispered,  as  her  keen  eyes  picked  the  squir 
rels  out  amongst  the  young  grain. 

These  were  the  wary  ones,  the  sports  in  the  direc 
tion  of  infinite  caution  who  had  shunned  the  poisoned 
grain  and  steel  traps  of  Dick's  vermin  catchers. 
They  were  the  survivors,  each  of  a  score  of  their 
fellows  not  so  cautious,  themselves  fit  to  repopulate 
the  hillside. 

Dick  filled  the  chamber  and  magazine  with  tiny 
cartridges,  examined  the  silencer,  and,  lying  at  full 
length,  leaning  on  his  elbow,  sighted  across  the 
meadow.  There  was  no  sound  of  explosion  when 
he  fired,  only  the  click  of  the  mechanism  as  the 
bullet  was  sped,  the  empty  cartridge  ejected,  a  fresh 
cartridge  flipped  into  the  chamber,  and  the  trigger 
re-cocked.  A  big,  dun-colored  squirrel  leaped  in  the 
air,  fell  over,  and  disappeared  in  the  grain.  Dick 
waited,  his  eye  along  the  rifle  and  directed  toward 
several  holes  around  which  the  dry  earth  showed 
widely  as  evidence  of  the  grain  which  had  been  de 
stroyed.  When  the  wounded  squirrel  appeared, 
scrambling  across  the  exposed  ground  to  safety,  the 
rifle  clicked  again  and  he  rolled  over  on  his  side 
and  lay  still. 

At  the  first  click,  every  squirrel  but  the  stricken 
one,  had  made  into  its  burrow.  Remained  nothing 
to  do  but  wait  for  their  curiosity  to  master  caution. 
This  was  the  interval  Dick  had  looked  forward  to. 
As  he  lay  and  scanned  the  hillside  for  curious  heads 
to  appear,  he  wondered  if  Paula  would  have  some 
thing  to  say  to  him.  In  trouble  she  was,  but  would 
she  keep  this  trouble  to  herself?  It  had  never  been 
her  way.  Always,  soon  or  late,  she  brought  her 


296  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

troubles  to  him.  But,  then,  he  reflected,  she  had 
never  had  a  trouble  of  this  nature  before.  It  was 
just  the  one  thing  that  she  would  be  least  prone  to 
discuss  with  him.  On  the  other  hand,  he  reasoned, 
there  was  her  everlasting  frankness.  He  had  mar 
veled  at  it,  and  joyed  in  it,  all  their  years  together. 
Was  it  to  fail  her  now? 

So  he  lay  and  pondered.  She  did  not  speak.  She 
was  not  restless.  He  could  hear  no  movement. 
When  he  glanced  to  the  side  at  her  he  saw  her  lying 
on  her  back,  eyes  closed,  arms  outstretched,  as  if 
tired. 

A  small  head,  the  color  of  the  dry  soil  of  its  home, 
peeped  from  a  hole.  Dick  waited  long  minutes,  un 
til,  assured  that  no  danger  lurked,  the  owner  of  the 
head  stood  full  up  on  its  hind  legs  to  seek  the  cause 
of  the  previous  click  that  had  startled  it.  Again  the 
rifle  clicked. 

"  Did  you  get  him?  "  Paula  queried,  without  open 
ing  her  eyes. 

"  Yea,  and  a  fat  one,"  Dick  answered.  "  I 
stopped  a  line  of  generations  right  there.11 

An  hour  passed.  The  afternoon  sun  beat  down 
but  was  not  uncomfortable  in  the  shade.  A  gentle 
breeze  fanned  the  young  grain  into  lazy  wavelets  at 
times,  and  stirred  the  redwood  boughs  above  them. 
Dick  added  a  third  squirrel  to  the  score.  Paula's 
book  lay  beside  her,  but  she  had  not  offered  to  read. 

"Anything  the  matter?"  he  finally  nerved  him 
self  to  ask. 

"  No ;  headache  —  a  beastly  little  neuralgic  hurt 
across  the  eyes,  that's  all." 

"  Too  much  embroidery,"  he  teased. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  297 

"  Not  guilty,"  was  her  reply. 

All  was  natural  enough  in  all  seeming;  but  Dick, 
as  he  permitted  an  unusually  big  squirrel  to  leave  its 
burrow  and  crawl  a  score  of  feet  across  the  bare 
earth  toward  the  grain,  thought  to  himself:  No, 
there  will  be  no  talk  between  us  this  day.  Nor  will 
we  nestle  and  kiss  lying  here  in  the  grass. 

His  victim  was  now  at  the  edge  of  the  grain.  He 
pulled  trigger.  The  creature  fell  over,  lay  still  a 
moment,  then  ran  in  quick  awkward  fashion  toward 
its  hole.  Click,  click,  click,  went  the  mechanism. 
Puffs  of  dust  leaped  from  the  earth  close  about  the 
fleeing  squirrel,  showing  the  closeness  of  the  misses. 
Dick  fired  as  rapidly  as  he  could  twitch  his  fore 
finger  on  the  trigger,  so  that  it  was  as  if  he  played 
a  stream  of  lead  from  a  hose. 

He  had  nearly  finished  refilling  the  magazine  when 
Paula  spoke. 

"  My!     What  a  fusillade.—     Get  him?  " 

"  Yea,  grandfather  of  all  squirrels,  a  mighty  grain- 
cater  and  destroyer  of  sustenance  for  young  calves. 
But  nine  long  smokeless  cartridges  on  one  squirrel 
doesn't  pay.  I'll  have  to  do  better." 

The  sun  dropped  lower.  The  breeze  died  out. 
Dick  managed  another  squirrel  and  sadly  watched 
the  hillside  for  more.  He  had  arranged  the  time 
and  made  his  bid  for  confidence.  The  situation  was 
as  grave  as  he  had  feared.  Graver  it  might  be,  for 
all  he  knew,  for  his  world  was  crumbling  about  him. 
Old  landmarks  were  shifting  their  places.  He  was 
bewildered,  shaken.  Had  it  been  any  other  woman 
than  Paula !  He  had  been  so  sure.  There  had 
been  their  dozen  years  to  vindicate  his  surety.  .  .  . 


298  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  Five  o'clock,  sun  he  get  low,"  he  announced,  ris 
ing  to  his  feet  and  preparing  to  help  her  up. 

"It  did  me  so  much  good  —  just  resting,"  she 
said,  as  they  started  for  the  horses.  "  My  eyes  feel 
much  better.  It's  just  as  well  I  didn't  try  to  read  to 
you." 

"  And  don't  be  piggy,"  Dick  warned,  as  lightly 
as  if  nothing  were  amiss  with  him.  "  Don't  dare 
steal  the  tiniest  peek  into  Le  Gallienne.  You've  got 
to  share  him  with  me  later  on.  Hold  up  your 
hand. —  Now,  honest  to  God,  Paul." 

"  Honest  to  God,"  she  obeyed. 

"  And  may  jackasses  dance  on  your  grandmother's 
grave — " 

"  And  may  jackasses  dance  on  my  grandmother's 
grave,"  she  solemnly  repeated. 

The  third  morning  of  Graham's  absence,  Dick  saw 
to  it  that  he  was  occupied  with  his  dairy  manager 
when  Paula  made  her  eleven  o'clock  pilgrimage, 
peeped  in  upon  him,  and  called  her  "  Good  morning, 
merry  gentleman,"  from  the  door.  The  Masons, 
arriving  in  several  machines  with  their  boisterous 
crowd  of  young  people,  saved  Paula  for  lunch  and 
the  afternoon;  and,  on  her  urging,  Dick  noted,  she 
made  the  evening  safe  by  holding  them  over  for 
bridge  and  dancing. 

But  the  fourth  morning,  the  day  of  Graham's 
expected  return,  Dick  was  alone  in  his  workroom  at 
eleven.  Bending  over  his  desk,  signing  letters,  he 
heard  Paula  tiptoe  into  the  room.  He  did  not  look 
up,  but  while  he  continued  writing  his  signature  he 
listened  with  all  his  soul  to  the  faint,  silken  swish  of 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  299 

her  kimono.  He  knew  when  she  was  bending  over 
him,  and  all  but  held  his  breath.  But  when  she  had 
softly  kissed  his  hair  and  called  her  "  Good  morning, 
merry  gentleman,"  she  evaded  the  hungry  sweep  of 
his  arm  and  laughed  her  way  out.  What  affected 
him  as  strongly  as  the  disappointment  was  the  hap 
piness  he  had  seen  in  her  face.  She,  who  so  poorly 
masked  her  moods,  was  bright-eyed  and  eager  as  a 
child.  And  it  was  on  this  afternoon  that  Graham 
was  expected,  Dick  could  not  escape  making  the  con 
nection. 

He  did  not  care  to  ascertain  if  she  had  replenished 
the  lilacs  in  the  tower  room,  and,  at  lunch,  which 
was  shared  with  three  farm  college  students  from 
Davis,  he  found  himself  forced  to  extemporize  a  busy 
afternoon  for  himself  when  Paula  tentatively  sug 
gested  that  she  would  drive  Graham  up  from  El 
dorado. 

"  Drive?"  Dick  asked. 

"  Duddy  and  Fuddy,"  she  explained.  '  They're 
all  on  edge,  and  I  just  feel  like  exercising  them  and 
myself.  Of  course,  if  you'll  share  the  exercise,  we'll 
drive  anywhere  you  say,  and  let  him  come  up  in  the 
machine." 

Dick  strove  not  to  think  there  was  anxiety  in  her 
manner  while  she  waited  for  him  to  accept  or  decline 
her  invitation. 

"  Poor  Duddy  and  Fuddy  would  be  in  the  happy 
hunting  grounds  if  they  had  to  cover  my  ground  this 
afternoon,"  he  laughed,  at  the  same  time  mapping 
his  program.  "  Between  now  and  dinner  I've  got 
to  do  a  hundred  and  twenty  miles.  I'm  taking  the 
racer,  and  it's  going  to  be  some  dust  and  bump  and 


300  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

only  an  occasional  low  place.  I  haven't  the  heart  to 
ask  you  along.  You  go  on  and  take  it  out  of  Duddy 
and  Fuddy." 

Paula  sighed,  but  so  poor  an  actress  was  she  that 
in  the  sigh,  intended  for  him  as  a  customary  reluct 
ant  yielding  of  his  company,  he  could  not  fail  to  de 
tect  the  relief  at  his  decision. 

"Whither  away?"  she  asked  brightly,  and  again 
he  noticed  the  color  in  her  face,  the  happiness,  and 
the  brilliance  of  her  eyes. 

"  Oh,  I'm  shooting  away  down  the  river  to  the 
dredging  work  —  Carlson  insists  I  must  advise  him 
—  and  then  up  in  to  Sacramento,  running  over  the 
Teal  Slough  land  on  the  way,  to  see  Wing  Fo 
Wong." 

"  And  in  heaven's  name  who  is  this  Wing  Fo 
Wong?"  she  laughingly  queried,  "  that  you  must 
trot  and  see  him?  " 

"  A  very  important  personage,  my  dear.  Worth 
all  of  two  millions  —  made  in  potatoes  and  aspar 
agus  down  in  the  Delta  country.  I'm  leasing  three 
hundred  acres  of  the  Teal  Slough  land  to  him." 
Dick  addressed  himself  to  the  farm  students. 
"  That  land  lies  just  out  of  Sacramento  on  the  west 
side  of  the  river.  It's  a  good  example  of  the  land 
famine  that  is  surely  coming.  It  was  tule  swamp 
when  I  bought  it,  and  I  was  well  laughed  at  by  the 
old-timers.  I  even  had  to  buy  out  a  dozen  hunting 
preserves.  It  averaged  me  eighteen  dollars  an  acre, 
and  not  so  many  years  ago  either. 

"  You  know  the  tule  swamps.  Worthless,  save 
for  ducks  and  low-water  pasturage.  It  cost  over 
three  hundred  an  acre  to  dredge  and  drain  and  to 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  301 

pay  my  quota  of  the  river  reclamation  work.  And 
on  what  basis  of  value  do  you  think  I  am  making  a 
ten  years*  lease  to  old  Wing  Fo  Wong?  Two  thou 
sand  an  acre.  I  couldn't  net  more  than  that  if  I 
truck-farmed  it  myself.  Those  Chinese  are  wizards 
with  vegetables,  and  gluttons  for  work.  No  eight 
hours  for  them.  It's  eighteen  hours.  The  last  coolie 
is  a  partner  with  a  microscopic  share.  That's  the  way 
Wing  Fo  Wong  gets  around  the  eight  hour  law." 

Twice  warned  and  once  arrested,  was  Dick 
through  the  long  afternoon.  He  drove  alone,  and 
though  he  drove  with  speed  he  drove  with  safety. 
Accidents,  for  which  he  personally  might  be  respon 
sible,  were  things  he  did  not  tolerate.  And  they 
never  occurred.  That  same  sureness  and  definite- 
ness  of  adjustment  with  which,  without  fumbling  or 
approximating,  he  picked  up  a  pencil  or  reached  for 
a  door-knob,  was  his  in  the  more  complicated  adjust 
ments,  with  which,  as  instance,  he  drove  a  high-pow 
ered  machine  at  high  speed  over  busy  country  roads. 

But  drive  as  he  would,  transact  business  as  he 
would,  at  high  pressure  with  Carlson  and  Wing  Fo 
Wong,  continually,  in  the  middle  ground  of  his  con 
sciousness,  persisted  the  thought  that  Paula  had  gone 
out  of  her  way  and  done  the  most  unusual  in  driv 
ing  Graham  the  long  eight  miles  from  Eldorado  to 
the  ranch. 

"  Phew !  "  he  started  to  mutter  a  thought  aloud, 
then  suspended  utterance  and  thought  as  he  jumped 
the  racer  from  forty-five  to  seventy  miles  an  hour, 
swept  past  to  the  left  of  a  horse  and  buggy  going 
in  the  same  direction,  and  slanted  back  to  the  right 


302  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

side  of  the  road  with  margin  to  spare  but  seemingly 
under  the  nose  of  a  run-about  coming  from  the  op 
posite  direction.  He  reduced  his  speed  to  fifty  and 
took  up  his  thought: 

"  Phew !  Imagine  little  Paul's  thoughts  if  I  dared 
that  drive  with  some  charming  girl!  " 

He  laughed  at  the  fancy  as  he  pictured  it,  for, 
most  early  in  their  marriage,  he  had  gauged  Paula's 
capacity  for  quiet  jealousy.  Never  had  she  made  a 
scene,  or  dropped  a  direct  remark,  or  raised  a  ques 
tion;  but  from  the  first,  quietly  but  unmistakably,  she 
had  conveyed  the  impression  of  hurt  that  was  hers 
if  he  at  all  unduly  attended  upon  any  woman. 

He  grinned  with  remembrance  of  Mrs.  De- 
hameny,  the  pretty  little  brunette  widow  —  Paula's 
friend,  not  his  —  who  had  visited  in  the  long  ago  in 
the  Big  House.  Paula  had  announced  that  she  was 
not  riding  that  afternoon  and,  at  lunch,  had  heard 
him  and  Mrs.  Dehameny  arrange  to  ride  into  the 
redwood  canyons  beyond  the  grove  of  the  philoso 
phers.  And  who  but  Paula,  not  long  after  their 
start,  should  overtake  them  and  make  the  party 
three !  He  had  smiled  to  himself  at  the  time,  and 
felt  immensely  tickled  with  Paula,  for  neither  Mrs. 
Dehameny  nor  the  ride  with  her  had  meant  anything 
to  him. 

So  it  was,  from  the  beginning,  that  he  had  re 
stricted  his  attentions  to  other  women.  Ever  since 
he  had  been  far  more  circumspect  than  Paula.  He 
had  even  encouraged  her,  given  her  a  free  hand  al 
ways,  had  been  proud  that  his  wife  did  attract  fine 
fellows,  had  been  glad  that  she  was  glad  to  be 
amused  or  entertained  by  them.  And  with  reason, 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  303 

\ 

he  mused.  He  had  been  so  safe,  so  sure  of  her  — 
more  so,  he  acknowledged,  than  had  she  any  right 
to  be  of  him.  And  the  dozen  years  had  vindicated 
his  attitude,  so  that  he  was  as  sure  of  her  as  he  was 
of  the  diurnal  rotation  of  the  earth.  And  now,  was 
the  form  his  fancy  took,  the  rotation  of  the  earth 
was  a  shaky  proposition  and  old  Oom  Paul's  flat 
world  might  be  worth  considering. 

He  lifted  the  gauntlet  from  his  left  wrist  to  snatch 
a  glimpse  at  his  watch.  In  five  minutes  Graham 
would  be  getting  off  the  train  at  Eldorado.  Dick, 
himself  homeward  bound  west  from  Sacramento, 
was  eating  up  the  miles.  In  a  quarter  of  an  hour 
the  train  that  he  identified  as  having  brought 
Graham,  went  by.  Not  until  he  was  well  past 
Eldorado  did  he  overtake  Buddy  and  Fuddy  and 
the  trap.  Graham  sat  beside  Paula,  who  was  driv 
ing.  Dick  slowed  down  as  he  passed,  waved  a  hello 
to  Graham,  and,  as  he  jumped  into  speed  again, 
called  cheerily: 

"  Sorry  I've  got  to  give  you  my  dust.  I'll  beat 
you  a  game  of  billiards  before  dinner,  Evan,  if  you 
ever  get  in." 


CHAPTER  XXVI 
"f  |   iHIS  can't  go  on.     We  must  do  something  — 


T 


at  once." 


They  were  in  the  music  room,  Paula  at 
the  piano,  her  face  turned  up  to  Graham  who  stood 
close  to  her,  almost  over  her. 

4  You  must  decide,"  Graham  continued. 

Neither  face  showed  happiness  in  the  great  thing 
that  had  come  upon  them,  now  that  they  considered 
what  they  must  do. 

"  But  I  don't  want  you  to  go,"  Paula  urged.  "  I 
don't  know  what  I  want.  You  must  bear  with  me. 
I  am  not  considering  myself.  I  am  past  considering 
myself.  But  I  must  consider  Dick.  I  must  consider 
you.  I  ...  I  am  so  unused  to  such  a  situation," 
she  concluded  with  a  wan  smile. 

"  But  it  must  be  settled,  dear  love.  Dick  is  not 
blind." 

"  What  has  there  been  for  him  to  see?  "  she  de 
manded.  "  Nothing,  except  that  one  kiss  in  the 
canyon,  and  he  couldn't  have  seen  that.  Do  you 
think  of  anything  else  —  I  challenge  you,  sir." 

1(  Would  that  there  were,"  he  met  the  lighter  touch 
in  her  mood,  then  immediately  relapsed.  "  I  am 
mad  over  you,  mad  for  you.  And  there  I  stop. 
I  do  not  know  if  you  are  equally  mad.  I  do  not 
know  if  you  are  mad  at  all." 

304 


THE  LITTLE  LADY  305 

As  he  spoke,  he  dropped  his  hand  to  hers  on  the 
keys,  and  she  gently  withdrew  it. 

"Don't  you  see?"  he  complained.  "  Yet  you 
wanted  me  to  come  back?  " 

"  I  wanted  you  to  come  back,"  she  acknowledged, 
with  her  straight  look  into  his  eyes.  "  I  wanted 
you  to  come  back,"  she  repeated,  more  softly,  as  if 
musing. 

"  And  I'm  all  at  sea,"  he  exclaimed  impatiently. 
"You  do  love  me?" 

"I  do  love  you,  Evan  —  you  know  that. 
But  .  .  ."  She  paused  and  seemed  to  be  weighing 
the  matter  judicially. 

"  But  what?  "  he  commanded.     "  Go  on." 

"  But  I  love  Dick,  too.     Isn't  it  ridiculous?  " 

He  did  not  respond  to  her  smile,  and  her  eyes 
delightedly  warmed  to  the  boyish  sullenness  that 
vexed  his  own  eyes.  A  thought  was  hot  on  his 
tongue,  but  he  restrained  the  utterance  of  it  while 
she  wondered  what  it  was,  disappointed  not  to  have 
had  it. 

"  It  will  work  out,"  she  assured  him  gravely.  "  It 
will  have  to  work  out  somehow.  Dick  says  all  things 
work  out.  All  is  change.  What  is  static  is  dead, 
and  we're  not  dead,  any  of  us  ...  are  we?  " 

"  I  don't  blame  you  for  loving  Dick,  for  .  .  . 
for  continuing  to  love  Dick,"  he  answered  impa 
tiently.  "  And  for  that  matter,  I  don't  see  what 
you  find  in  me  compared  with  him.  This  is  honest. 
He  is  a  great  man  to  me,  and  Great  Heart  is  his 
name  — "  she  rewarded  him  with  a  smile  and  nod  of 
approval.  "  But  if  you  continue  to  love  Dick,  how 
about  me  ?  " 


306  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  But  I  love  you,  too." 

"  It  can't  be,"  he  cried,  tearing  himself  from  the 
piano  to  make  a  hasty  march  across  the  room  and 
stand  contemplating  the  Keith  on  the  opposite  wall 
as  if  he  had  never  seen  it  before. 

She  waited  with  a  quiet  smile,  pleasuring  in  his 
unruly  impetuousness. 

t  You  can't  love  two  men  at  once,"  he  flung  at  her. 

"  Oh,  but  I  do,  Evan.  That's  what  I  am  trying  to 
work  out.  Only  I  don't  know  which  I  love  more. 
Dick  I  have  known  a  long  time.  You  .  .  .  you  are 
a—" 

"  Recent  acquaintance,"  he  broke  in,  returning  to 
her  with  the  same  angry  stride. 

"  Not  that,  no,  not  that,  Evan.  You  have  made  a 
revelation  to  me  of  myself.  I  love  you  as  much  as 
Dick.  I  love  you  more.  I  —  I  don't  know." 

She  broke  down  and  buried  her  face  in  her  hands, 
permitting  his  hand  to  rest  tenderly  on  her  shoulder. 

4  You  see  it  is  not  easy  for  me,"  she  went  on. 

4  There  is  so  much  involved,  so  much  that  I  cannot 

understand.     You  say  you   are   all  at  sea.     Then 

think  of  me  all  at  sea  and  worse  confounded.     You 

-  oh,  why  talk  about  it  —  you  are  a  man  with  a 
man's  experiences,  with  a  man's  nature.  It  is  all 
very  simple  to  you.  '  She  loves  me,  she  loves  me 
not.'  But  I  am  tangled,  confused.  I  —  and  I 
wasn't  born  yesterday  —  have  had  no  experience  in 
loving  variously.  I  have  never  had  affairs.  I  loved 
only  one  man  .  .  .  and  now  you.  You,  and  this 
love  for  you,  have  broken  into  a  perfect  marriage, 
Evan  — " 

"  I  know  — "  he  said. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  307 

" —  I  don't  know,"  she  went  on.  "I  must 
have  time,  either  to  work  it  out  myself  or  to  let  it 
work  itself  out.  If  it  only  weren't  for  Dick  .  .  ." 
her  voice  trailed  off  pathetically. 

Unconsciously,  Graham's  hand  went  farther  about 
her  shoulder. 

"  No,  no — not  yet,"  she  said  softly,  as  softly  she 
removed  it,  her  own  lingering  caressingly  on  his  a 
moment  ere  she  released  it.  '  When  you  touch  me, 
I  can't  think,"  she  begged.  "  I  -  -  I  can't  think." 

"  Then  I  must  go,"  he  threatened,  without  any 
sense  of  threatening.  She  made  a  gesture  of  pro 
test.  '  The  present  situation  is  impossible,  unbear 
able.  I  feel  like  a  cur,  and  all  the  time  I  know  I 
am  not  a  cur.  I  hate  deception  —  oh,  I  can  lie  with 
the  Pathan,  to  the  Pathan  —  but  I  can't  deceive  a 
man  like  Great  Heart.  I'd  prefer  going  right  up  to 
him  and  saying:  l  Dick,  I  love  your  wife.  She 
loves  me.  What  are  you  going  to  do  about  it?  ' 

"  Do  so,"  Paula  said,  fired  for  the  moment. 

Graham  straightened  up  with  resolution. 

"  I  will.     And  now." 

"  No,  no,"  she  cried  in  sudden  panic.  '  You 
must  go  away."  Again  her  voice  trailed  off,  as  she 
said,  "  But  I  can't  let  you  go." 

If  Dick  had  had  any  reason  to  doubt  his  suspicion 
of  the  state  of  Paula's  heart,  that  reason  vanished 
with  the  return  of  Graham.  He  need  look  nowhere 
for  confirmation  save  to  Paula.  She  was  in  a  flushed 
awakening,  burgeoning  like  the  full  spring  all  about 
them,  a  happier  tone  in  her  happy  laugh,  a  richer 
song  in  her  throat,  a  warmness  of  excitement  and  a 


308  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

continuous  energy  of  action  animating  her.  She  was 
up  early  and  to  bed  late.  She  did  not  conserve  her 
self,  but  seemed  to  live  on  the  champagne  of  her 
spirits,  until  Dick  wondered  if  it  was  because  she  did 
not  dare  allow  herself  time  to  think. 

He  watched  her  lose  flesh,  and  acknowledged  to 
himself  that  the  one  result  was  to  make  her  look 
lovelier  than  ever,  to  take  on  an  almost  spiritual 
delicacy  under  her  natural  vividness  of  color  and 
charm. 

And  the  Big  House  ran  on  in  its  frictionless, 
happy,  and  remorseless  way.  Dick  sometimes  specu 
lated  how  long  it  would  continue  so  to  run  on,  and 
recoiled  from  contemplation  of  a  future  in  which  it 
might  not  so  run  on.  As  yet,  he  was  confident,  no 
one  knew,  no  one  guessed,  but  himself.  But  how 
long  could  that  continue  ?  Not  long,  he  was  certain. 
Paula  was  not  sufficiently  the  actress.  And  were  she 
a  master  at  concealment  of  trivial,  sordid  detail,  yet 
the  new  note  and  flush  of  her  would  be  beyond  the 
power  of  any  woman  to  hide. 

He  knew  his  Asiatic  servants  were  marvels  of 
discernment  —  and  discretion,  he  had  to  add.  But 
there  were  the  women.  Women  were  cats.  To  the 
best  of  them  it  would  be  great  joy  to  catch  the 
radiant,  unimpeachable  Paula  as  clay  as  any  daugh 
ter  of  Eve.  And  any  chance  woman  in  the  house, 
for  a  day,  or  an  evening,  might  glimpse  the  situation 
—  Paula's  situation,  at  least,  for  he  could  not  make 
out  Graham's  attitude  yet.  Trust  a  woman  to  catch 
a  woman. 

But  Paula,  different  in  other  ways,  was  different  in 
this.  He  had  never  seen  her  display  cattishness, 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  309 

never  known  her  to  be  on  the  lookout  for  other 
women  on  the  chance  of  catching  them  tripping  — 
except  in  relation  to  him.  And  he  grinned  again 
at  the  deliciousness  of  the  affair  with  Mrs.  De- 
hameney  which  had  been  an  affair  only  in  Paula's 
apprehension. 

Among  other  things  of  wonderment,  Dick  specu 
lated  if  Paula  wondered  if  he  knew. 

And  Paula  did  wonder,  and  for  a  time  without 
avail.  She  could  detect  no  change  in  his  customary 
ways  and  moods  or  treatment  of  her.  He  turned 
off  his  prodigious  amount  of  work  as  usual,  played 
as  usual,  chanted  his  songs,  and  was  the  happy  good 
fellow.  She  tried  to  imagine  an  added  sweetness 
toward  her,  but  vexed  herself  with  the  fear  that  it 
was  imagined. 

But  it  was  not  for  long  that  she  was  in  doubt. 
Sometimes  in  a  crowd,  at  table,  in  the  living  room 
in  the  evening,  or  at  cards,  she  would  gaze  at  him 
through  half-veiled  lashes  when  he  was  unaware, 
until  she  was  certain  she  saw  the  knowledge  in  his 
eyes  and  face.  But  no  hint  of  this  did  she  give  to 
Graham.  His  knowing  would  not  help  matters.  It 
might  even  send  him  away,  which  she  frankly  ad 
mitted  to  herself  was  the  last  thing  she  should  want 
to  happen. 

But  when  she  came  to  a  realization  that  she  was 
almost  certain  Dick  knew  or  guessed,  she  hardened, 
deliberately  dared  to  play  with  the  fire.  If  Dick 
knew  —  since  he  knew,  she  framed  it  to  herself  — 
why  did  he  not  speak?  He  was  ever  a  straight 
talker.  She  both  desired  and  feared  that  he  might, 
until  the  fear  faded  and  her  earnest  hope  was  that 


3io  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

he  would.  He  was  the  one  who  acted,  did  things, 
no  matter  what  they  were.  She  had  always  de 
pended  upon  him  as  the  doer.  Graham  had  called 
the  situation  a  triangle.  Well,  Dick  could  solve  it. 
He  could  solve  anything.  Then  why  didn't  he? 

In  the  meantime,  she  persisted  in  her  ardent  reck 
lessness,  trying  not  to  feel  the  conscience-pricks  of 
her  divided  allegiance,  refusing  to  think  too  deeply, 
riding  the  top  of  the  wave  of  her  life  —  as  she  as 
sured  herself,  living,  living,  living.  At  times  she 
scarcely  knew  what  she  thought,  save  that  she  was 
very  proud  in  having  two  such  men  at  heel.  Pride 
had  always  been  one  of  her  dominant  key-notes  — 
•  ^  \pride  of  accomplishment,  achievement,  mastery,  as 
with  her  music,  her  appearance,  her  swimming.  It 
was  all  one  —  to  dance,  as  she  well  knew,  beauti 
fully;  to  dress  with  distinction  and  beauty;  to  swan- 
dive,  all  grace  and  courage,  as  few  women  dared; 
or,  all  fragility,  to  avalanche  down  the  spill-way  on 
the  back  of  Mountain  Lad  and  by  the  will  and  steel 
of  her  swim  the  huge  beast  across  the  tank. 

She  was  proud,  a  woman  of  their  own  race  and 
type,  to  watch  these  two  gray-eyed  blond  men  to 
gether.  She  was  excited,  feverish,  but  not  nervous. 
Quite  coldly,  sometimes,  she  compared  the  two  when 
they  were  together,  and  puzzled  to  know  for  which 
of  them  she  made  herself  more  beautiful,  more  en 
ticing.  Graham  she  held,  and  she  had  held  Dick 
and  strove  still  to  hold  him. 

There  was  almost  a  touch  of  cruelty  in  the  tingles 
of  pride  that  were  hers  at  thought  of  these  two  royal 
men  suffering  for  her  and  because  of  her;  for  she  did 
not  hide  from  herself  the  conviction  that  if  Dick 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  311 

knew,  or,  rather,  since  he  did  know,  he,  too,  must 
be  suffering.  She  assured  herself  that  she  was  a 
woman  of  imagination  and  purpose  in  sex  matters, 
and  that  no  part  of  her  attraction  toward  Graham 
lay  merely  in  his  freshness,  newness,  difference. 
And  she  denied  to  herself  that  passion  played  more 
than  the  most  minor  part.  Deep  down  she  was  con 
scious  of  her  own  recklessness  and  madness,  and  of  an 
end  to  it  all  that  could  not  but  be  dreadful  to  some 
one  of  them  or  all  of  them.  But  she  was  content 
willfully  to  flutter  far  above  such  deeps  and  to  refuse 
to  consider  their  existence.  Alone,  looking  at  her 
self  in  her  mirror,  she  would  shake  her  head  in  mock 
reproof  and  cry  out,  "  Oh,  you  huntress!  You 
huntress!"  And  when  she  did  permit  herself  to 
think  a  little  gravely,  it  was  to  admit  that  Shaw  and 
the  sages  of  the  madrono  grove  might  be  right  in 
their  diatribes  on  the  hunting  proclivities  of  women. 
She  denied  Dar  Hyal's  statement  that  woman  was 
nature's  failure  to  make  a  man;  but  again  and  again 
came  to  her  Wilde's,  "  Woman  attacks  by  sudden 
and  strange  surrenders."  Had  she  so  attacked 
Graham?  she  asked  herself.  Sudden  and  strange, 
to  her,  were  the  surrenders  she  had  already  made. 
Were  there  to  be  more?  He  wanted  to  go.  With 
her,  or  without  her,  he  wanted  to  go.  But  she  helo^ 
him  —  how?  Was  there  a  tacit  promise  of  sur-\ 
renders  to  come?  And  she  would  laugh  away  fur-\ 
ther  consideration,  confine  herself  to  the  fleeting  \ 
present,  and  make  her  body  more  beautiful,  and 
mood  herself  to  be  more  fascinating,  and  glow  with 
happiness  in  that  she  was  living,  thrilling,  as  she  had 
never  dreamed  to  live  and  thrill. 


; 


CHAPTER  XXVII 

BUT  it  is  not  the  way  for  a  man  and  a  woman, 
in  propinquity,  to  maintain  a  definite,  unwav 
ering  distance  asunder.     Imperceptibly  Paula 
and  Graham  drew  closer.     From  lingering  eye-gaz- 
ings  and  hand-touchings  the  way  led  to  permitted 
caresses,  until  there  was  a  second  clasping  in  the 
arms  and  a  second  kiss  long  on  the  lips.     Nor  this 
time  did  Paula  flame  in  anger.     Instead,  she  com 
manded: 

'  You  must  not  go." 

"  I  must  not  stay,"  Graham  reiterated  for  the 
thousandth  time.  "  Oh,  I  have  kissed  behind  doors, 
and  been  guilty  of  all  the  rest  of  the  silly  rubbish," 
he  complained.  "  But  this  is  you,  and  this  is  Dick." 

"  It  will  work  out,  I  tell  you,  Evan." 

"  Come  with  me  then  and  of  ourselves  work  it 
out.  Come  now." 

She  recoiled. 

"  Remember,"  Graham  encouraged,  "  what  Dick 
said  at  dinner  the  night  Leo  fought  the  dragons  — 
that  if  it  were  you,  Paula,  his  wife,  who  ran  away, 
he  would  say  '  Bless  you,  my  children.'  ' 

"  And  that  is  just  why  it  is  so  hard,  Evan.  He 
is  Great  Heart.  You  named  him  well.  Listen  — 
you  watch  him  now.  He  is  as  gentle  as  he  said  he 
would  be  that  night  —  gentle  toward  me,  I  mean. 
And  more.  You  watch  him  — " 

312 


THE  LITTLE  LADY  313 

"He  knows?  —  he  has  spoken?"  Graham 
broke  in. 

"  He  has  not  spoken,  but  I  am  sure  he  knows,  or 
guesses.  You  watch  him.  He  won't  compete 
against  you  — " 

"  Compete !  " 

"  Just  that.  He  won't  compete.  Remember  at 
the  rodeo  yesterday.  He  was  breaking  mustangs 
when  our  party  arrived,  but  he  never  mounted 
again.  Now  he  is  a  wonderful  horse-breaker.  You 
tried  your  hand.  Frankly,  while  you  did  fairly  well, 
you  couldn't  touch  him.  But  he  wouldn't  show  off 
against  you.  That  alone  would  make  me  certain 
that  he  guesses. 

"  Listen.  Of  late  haven't  you  noticed  that  he 
never  questions  a  statement  you  make,  as  he  used  to 
question,  as  he  questions  every  one  else.  He  con 
tinues  to  play  billiards  with  you,  because  there  you 
best  him.  He  fences  and  singlesticks  with  you  — 
there  you  are  even.  But  he  won't  box  or  wrestle 
with  you." 

"  He  can  out-box  and  out-wrestle  me,"  Graham 
muttered  ruefully. 

"  You  watch  and  you  will  see  what  I  mean  by  not 
competing.  He  is  treating  me  like  a  spirited  colt, 
giving  me  my  head  to  make  a  mess  of  things  if  I 
want  to.  Not  for  the  world  would  he  interfere. 
Oh,  trust  me,  I  know  him.  It  is  his  own  code  that 
he  is  living  up  to.  He  could  teach  the  philosophers 
what  applied  philosophy  is. ' 

"No,  no;  listen,"  she  rushed  over  Graham's  at 
tempt  to  interrupt.  "  I  want  to  tell  you  more. 
There  is  a  secret  staircase  that  goes  up  from  the 


3H  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

library  to  Dick's  work  room.  Only  he  and  I  use 
it,  and  his  secretaries.  When  you  arrive  at  the 
head  of  it,  you  are  right  in  his  room,  surrounded  by 
shelves  of  books.  I  have  just  come  from  there.  I 
was  going  in  to  see  him  when  I  heard  voices.  Of 
course  it  was  ranch  business,  I  thought,  and  they 
would  soon  be  gone.  So  I  waited.  It  was  ranch 
business,  but  it  was  so  interesting,  so,  what  Hancock 
would  call,  illuminating,  that  I  remained  and  eaves 
dropped.  It  was  illuminating  of  Dick,  I  mean. 

"  It  was  the  wife  of  one  of  the  workmen  Dick 
had  on  the  carpet.  Such  things  do  arise  on  a  large 
place  like  this.  I  wouldn't  know  the  woman  if  I  saw 
her,  and  I  didn't  recognize  her  name.  She  was 
whimpering  out  her  trouble  when  Dick  stopped  her. 
4  Never  mind  all  that/  he  said.  '  What  I  want  to 
know  is,  did  you  give  Smith  any  encouragement? ' 

"  Smith  isn't  his  name,  but  he  is  one  of  our  fore 
men  and  has  worked  eight  years  for  Dick. 

"  *  Oh,  no,  sir,'  I  could  hear  her  answer.  *  He 
went  out  of  his  way  from  the  first  to  bother  me. 
I've  tried  to  keep  out  of  his  way,  always.  Besides, 
my  husband's  a  violent-tempered  man,  and  I  did  so 
want  him  to  hold  his  job  here.  He's  worked  nearly 
a  year  for  you  now,  and  there  aren't  any  complaints, 
are  there?  Before  that  it  was  irregular  work  for 
a  long  time,  and  we  had  real  hard  times.  It  wasn't 
his  fault.  He  ain't  a  drinking  man.  He  always  — ' 

"  '  That's  all  right,'  Dick  stopped  her.  '  His 
work  and  habits  have  nothing  to  do  with  the  matter. 
Now  you  are  sure  you  have  never  encouraged  Mr. 
Smith  in  any  way? '  And  she  was  so  sure  that  she 
talked  for  ten  minutes,  detailing  the  foreman's  per- 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  315 

sedition  of  her.  She  had  a  pleasant  voice  —  one  of 
those  sweet,  timid,  woman's  voices,  and  undoubtedly 
is  quite  attractive.  It  was  all  I  could  do  to  resist 
peeping.  I  wanted  to  see  what  she  looked  like. 

u  '  Now  this  trouble  yesterday  morning,'  Dick 
said.  *  Was  it  general?  I  mean,  outside  of  your 
husband,  and  Mr.  Smith,  was  the  scene  such  that 
those  who  live  around  you  knew  of  it  ?  ' 

14  '  Yes,  sir.  You  see,  he  had  no  right  to  come 
into  my  kitchen.  My  husband  doesn't  work  under 
him  anyway.  And  he  had  his  arm  around  me  and 
was  trying  to  kiss  me  when  my  husband  came  in. 
My  husband  has  a  temper,  but  he  ain't  overly  strong. 
Mr.  Smith  would  make  two  of  him.  So  he  pulled  a 
knife,  and  Mr.  Smith  got  him  by  the  arms,  and  they 
fought  all  over  the  kitchen.  I  knew  there  was  mur 
der  going  to  be  done  and  I  run  out  screaming  for 
help.  The  folks  in  the  other  cottages'd  heard  the 
racket  already.  They'd  smashed  the  window  and 
the  cook  stove,  and  the  place  was  filled  with  smoke 
and  ashes  when  the  neighbors  dragged  them  away 
from  each  other.  I'd  done  nothing  to  deserve  all 
that  disgrace.  You  know,  sir,  the  way  the  women 
will  talk  — 

"  And  Dick  hushed  her  up  there,  and  took  all  of 
five  minutes  more  in  getting  rid  of  her.  Her  great 
fear  was  that  her  husband  would  lose  his  place. 
From  what  Dick  told  her,  I  waited.  He  had  made 
no  decision,  and  I  knew  the  foreman  was  next  on  the 
carpet.  In  he  came.  I'd  have  given  the  world  to 
see  him.  But  I  could  only  listen. 

"  Dick  jumped  right  into  the  thick  of  it.  He  de 
scribed  the  scene  and  uproar,  and  Smith  acknowl- 


316  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

edged  that  it  had  been  riotous  for  a  while.  '  She 
says  she  gave  you  no  encouragement,'  Dick  said 
next. 

"  *  Then  she  lies,'  said  Smith.  '  She  has  that  way 
of  looking  with  her  eyes  that's  an  invitation.  She 
looked  at  me  that  way  from  the  first.  But  it  was  by 
word-of-mouth  invitation  that  I  was  in  her  kitchen 
yesterday  morning.  We  didn't  expect  the  husband. 
But  she  began  to  struggle  when  he  hove  in  sight. 
When  she  says  she  gave  me  no  encouragement  — ' 

"  '  Never  mind  all  that,'  Dick  stopped  him.  '  It's 
not  essential.'  '  But  it  is,  Mr.  Forrest,  if  I  am  to 
clear  myself,'  Smith  insisted. 

"  '  No;  it  is  not  essential  to  the  thing  you  can't 
clear  yourself  of,'  Dick  answered,  and  I  could  hear 
that  cold,  hard,  judicial  note  come  into  his  voice. 
Smith  could  not  understand.  Dick  told  him.  *  The 
thing  you  have  been  guilty  of,  Mr.  Smith,  is  the 
scene,  the  disturbance,  the  scandal,  the  wagging  of 
the  women's  tongues  now  going  on  forty  to  the  min 
ute,  the  impairment  of  the  discipline  and  order  of 
the  ranch,  all  of  which  is  boiled  down  to  the  one 
grave  thing,  the  hurt  to  the  ranch  efficiency.' 

"  And  still  Smith  couldn't  see.  He  thought  the 
charge  was  of  violating  social  morality  by  pursuing  a 
married  woman,  and  tried  to  mitigate  the  offense  by 
showing  the  woman  encouraged  him  and  by  plead 
ing:  '  And  after  all,  Mr.  Forrest,  a  man  is  only  a 
man,  and  I  admit  she  made  a  fool  of  me  and  I  made 
a  fool  of  myself.' 

"  '  Mr.  Smith,'  Dick  said.  '  You've  worked  for 
me  eight  years.  You've  been  a  foreman  six  years 
of  that  time.  I 'have  no  complaint  against  your 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  317 

work.  You  certainly  do  know  how  to  handle  labor. 
About  your  personal  morality  I  don't  care  a  damn. 
You  can  be  a  Mormon  or  a  Turk  for  all  it  matters 
to  me.  Your  private  acts  are  your  private  acts, 
and  are  no  concern  of  mine  as  long  as  they  do  not 
fe  interfere  with  your  work  or  my  ranch.  Any  one 
of  my  drivers  can  drink  his  head  off  Saturday  night, 
and  every  Saturday  night.  That's  his  business. 
But  the  minute  he  shows  a  hold-over  on  Monday 
morning  that  is  taken  out  on  my  horses,  that  excites 
them,  or  injures  them,  or  threatens  to  injure  them, 
or  that  decreases  in  the  slightest  the  work  they  should 
perform  on  Monday,  that  moment  it  is  my  business 
and  the  driver  goes  down  the  hill.' 

"  *  You,  you  mean,  Mr.  Forrest,'  Smith  stuttered, 
'  that,  that  I'm  to  go  down  the  hill?  '  '  That  is  just 
what  I  mean,  Mr.  Smith.  You  are  to  go  down  the 
hill,  not  because  you  climbed  over  another  man's 
fence  —  that's  your  business  and  his;  but  because 
you  were  guilty  of  causing  a  disturbance  that  is  an 
impairment  of  ranch  efficiency.' 

"  Do  you  know,  Evan,"  Paula  broke  in  on  her 
recital,  "  Dick  can  nose  more  human  tragedy  out 
of  columns  of  ranch  statistics  than  can  the  average 
fiction  writer  out  of  the  whirl  of  a  great  city.  Take 
the  milk  reports  —  the  individual  reports  of  the 
milkers  — -  so  many  pounds  of  milk,  morning  and 
night,  from  cow  so-and-so,  so  many  pounds  from 
cow  so-and-so.  He  doesn't  have  to  know  the  man. 
But  there  is  a  decrease  in  the  weight  of  milk.  c  Mr. 
Parkman,'  he'll  say  to  the  head  dairyman,  *  is  Barchi 
Peratta  married?'  '  Yes,  sir.'  l  Is  he  having 
trouble  with  his  wife?'  '  Yes,  ^ir.' 


318  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  Or  it  will  be :  *  Mr.  Parkman,  Simpkins  has 
the  best  long-time  record  of  any  of  our  milkers. 
Now  he's  slumped.  What's  up?'  Mr.  Parkman 
doesn't  know.  *  Investigate,'  says  Dick.  *  There's 
something  on  his  chest.  Talk  to  him  like  an  uncle 
and  find  out.  We've  got  to  get  it  off  his  chest.' 
And  Mr.  Parkman  finds  out.  Simpkins'  boy,  work- 
ing  his  way  through  Stanford  University,  has  elected 
the  joy-ride  path  and  is  in  jail  waiting  trial  for  for 
gery.  Dick  put  his  own  lawyers  on  the  case, 
smoothed  it  over,  got  the  boy  out  on  probation,  and 
Simpkins'  milk  reports  came  back  to  par.  And  the 
best  of  it  is,  the  boy  made  good,  Dick  kept  an  eye 
on  him,  saw  him  through  the  college  of  engineering, 
and  he's  now  working  for  Dick  on  the  dredging  end, 
earning  a  hundred  and  fifty  a  month,  married,  with 
a  future  before  him,  and  his  father  still  milks." 

1  You  are  right,"  Graham  murmured  sympa 
thetically.  "  I  well  named  him  when  I  named  him 
Great  Heart." 

"  I  call  him  my  Rock  of  Ages,"  Paula  said  grate 
fully.  "  He  is  so  solid.  He  stands  in  any  storm. — 
Oh,  you  don't  really  know  him.  He  is  so  sure. 
He  stands  right  up.  He's  never  taken  a  cropper  in 
his  life.  God  smiles  on  him.  God  has  always 
smiled  on  him.  He's  never  Leen  beaten  down  to  his 
knees  .  .  .  yet.  I  ...  I  should  not  care  to  see 
that  sight.  It  would  be  heartbreaking.  And, 
Evan  — "  Her  hand  went  out  to  his  in  a  pleading 
gesture  that  merged  into  a  half-caress.  " —  I  am 
afraid  for  him  now.  That  is  why  I  don't  know  what 
to  do.  It  is  not  for  myself  that  I  back  and  fill 
and  hesitate.  If  he  were  ignoble,  if  he  were  nar- 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  319 

row,  if  he  were  weak  or  had  one  tiniest  shred  of 
meanness,  if  he  had  ever  been  beaten  to  his  knees 
before,  why,  my  dear,  my  dear,  I  should  have  been 
gone  with  you  long  ago." 

Her  eyes  filled  with  sudden  moisture.  She  stilled 
'him  with  a  pressure  of  her  hand,  and,  to  regain 
herself,  she  went  back  to  her  recital: 

"  '  Your  little  finger,  Mr.  Smith,  I  consider  worth 
more  to  me  and  to  the  world,'  Dick  told  him,  '  than 
the  whole  body  of  this  woman's  husband.  Here's 
the  report  on  him:  willing,  eager  to  please,  not 
bright,  not  strong,  an  indifferent  workman  at  best. 
Yet  you  have  to  go  down  the  hill,  and  I  am  very, 
very  sorry.' 

"  Oh,  yes,  there  was  more.  But  I've  given  you 
the  main  of  it.  You  see  Dick's  code  there.  And 
he  lives  his  code.  He  accords  latitude  to  the  in 
dividual.  Whatever  the  individual  may  do,  so  long 
as  it  does  not  hurt  the  group  of  individuals  in  which 
he  lives,  is  his  own  affair.  He  believed  Smith  had 
a  perfect  right  to  love  the  woman,  and  to  be  loved  by 
her  if  it  came  to  that.  I  have  heard  him  always  say 
that  love  could  not  be  held  nor  enforced.  Truly, 
did  I  go  with  you,  he  would  say,  '  Bless  you,  my 
children.'  Though  it  broke  his  heart  he  would  say 
it.  Past  love,  he  believes,  gives  no  hold  over  the 
present.  And  every  hour  of  love,  I  have  heard  him 
say,  pays  for  itself,  on  both  sides,  quittance  in  full. 
He  claims  there  can  be  no  such  thing  as  a  love-debt, 
laughs  at  the  absurdity  of  love-claims." 

"  And  I  agree  with  him,"  Graham  said.  "  *  You 
promised  to  love  me  always,'  says  the  jilted  one, 
and  then  strives  to  collect  as  if  it  were  a  promissory 


320  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

note  for  so  many  dollars.  Dollars  are  dollars,  but 
love  lives  or  dies.  When  it  is  dead  how  can  it  be 
collected?  We  are  all  agreed,  and  the  way  is  sim 
ple.  We  love.  It  is  enough.  Why  delay  another 
minute?  " 

His  fingers  strayed  along  her  fingers  on  the  key-1 
board  as  he  bent  to  her,  first  kissing  her  hair,  then 
slowly  turning  her  face  up  to  his  and  kissing  her  will 
ing  lips. 

"  Dick  does  not  love  me  like  you,"  she  said;  "  not 
madly,  I  mean.  He  has  had  me  so  long,  I  think  I 
have  become  a  habit  to  him.  And  often  and  often, 
before  I  knew  you,  I  used  to  puzzle  whether  he 
cared  more  for  the  ranch  or  more  for  me." 

"  It  is  so  simple,"  Graham  urged.  "  All  we  have 
to  do  is  to  be  straightforward.  Let  us  go." 

He  drew  her  to  her  feet  and  made  as  if  to  start. 

But  she  drew  away  from  him  suddenly,  sat  down, 
and  buried  her  flushed  face  in  her  hands. 

"  You  do  not  understand,  Evan.  I  love  Dick. 
I  shall  always  love  him." 

"  And  me?  "  Graham  demanded  sharply. 

"  Oh,  without  saying,"  she  smiled.  "  You  are 
the  only  man,  besides  Dick,  that  has  ever  kissed  me 
this  .  .  .  way,  and  that  I  have  kissed  this  way. 
But  I  can't  make  up  my  mind.  The  triangle,  as  you 
call  it,  must  be  solved  for  me.  I  can't  solve  it  my 
self.  I  compare  the  two  of  you,  weigh  you,  measure 
you.  I  remember  Dick  and  all  our  past  years.  And 
I  consult  my  heart  for  you.  And  I  don't  know.  I 
don't  know.  You  are  a  great  man,  my  great  lover. 
But  Dick  is  a  greater  man  than  you.  You  —  you 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  321 

are  more  clay,  more-- I  grope  to  describe  you  — 
more  human,  I  fancy.  And  that  is  why  I  love  you 
more  ...  or  at  least  I  think  perhaps  I  do. 

"  But  wait,"  she  resisted  him,  prisoning  his  eager 
hand  in  hers.  '  There  is  more  I  want  to  say.  I 
remember  Dick  and  all  our  past  years.  But  I  re 
member  him  to-day,  as  well,  and  to-morrow.  I  can 
not  bear  the  thought  that  any  man  should  pity  my 
husband,  that  you  should  pity  him,  and  pity  him 
you  must  when  I  confess  that  I  love  you  more. 
That  is  why  I  am  not  sure.  That  is  why  I  so  quickly 
take  it  back  and  do  not  know. 

"  I'd  die  of  shame  if  through  act  of  mine  any  man 
pitied  Dick.  Truly,  I  would.  Of  all  things 
ghastly,  I  can  think  of  none  so  ghastly  as  Dick  be 
ing  pitied.  He  has  never  been  pitied  in  his  life. 
He  has  always  been  top-dog  —  bright,  light,  strong, 
unassailable.  And  more,  he  doesn't  deserve  pity. 
And  it's  my  fault  .  .  .  and  yours,  Evan." 

She  abruptly  thrust  Evan's  hand  away. 

"  And  every  act,  every  permitted  touch  of  you, 
does  make  him  pitiable.  Don't  you  see  how  tangled 
it  is  for  me?  And  then  there  is  my  own  pride. 
That  you  should  see  me  disloyal  to  him  in  little 
things,  such  as  this — "  (she  caught  his  hand 
again  and  caressed  it  with  soft  finger-tips) 
" —  hurts  me  in  my  love  for  you,  diminishes  me, 
must  diminish  me  in  your  eyes.  I  shrink  from  the 
thought  that  my  disloyalty  to  him  in  this  I  do  - 
(she  laid  his  hand  against  her  cheek)  " — gives  / 
you  reason  to  pity  him  and  censure  me." 

She  soothed  the  impatience  of  the  hand  on  her 


322  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

cheek,  and,  almost  absently,  musingly  scrutinizing  it 
without  consciously  seeing  it,  turned  it  over  and 
slowly  kissed  the  palm.  The  next  moment  she  was 
drawn  to  her  feet  and  into  his  arms. 

;<  There,  you  see,"  was  her  reproach  as  she  dis 
engaged  herself. 

"Why  do  you  tell  me  all  this  about  Dick? 
Graham  demanded  another  time,  as  they  walked 
their  horses  side  by  side.  "  To  keep  me  away? 
To  protect  yourself  from  me?" 

Paula  nodded,  then  quickly  added,  "  No,  not  quite 
that.  Because  you  know  I  don't  want  to  keep  you 
away  .  .  .  too  far.  I  say  it  because  Dick  is  so 
much  in  my  mind.  For  twelve  years,  you  realize, 
he  filled  my  mind.  I  say  it  because  .  .  .  because  I 
think  it,  I  suppose.  Think!  The  situation!  You 
are  trespassing  on  a  perfect  marriage." 

"  I  know  it,"  he  answered.  "  And  I  do  not  like 
the  role  of  trespasser.  It  is  your  insistence,  instead 
of  going  away  with  me,  that  I  should  trespass.  And 
I  can't  help  it.  I  think  away  from  you,  try  to  force 
my  thoughts  elsewhere.  I  did  half  a  chapter  this 
morning,  and  I  know  it's  rotten  and  will  have  to  be 
rewritten.  For  I  can't  succeed  in  thinking  away 
from  you.  What  is  South  America  and  its  eth 
nology  compared  to  you?  And  when  I  come  near 
you  my  arms  go  about  you  before  I  know  what  I  am 
doing.  And,  by  God,  you  want  them  there,  you 
want  them  there,  you  know  it." 

Paula  gathered  her  reins  in  signal  for  a  gallop, 
but  first,  with  a  roguish  smile,  she  acknowledged. 

"  I  do  want  them  there,  dear  trespasser." 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  323 

Paula  yielded  and  fought  at  the  same  time. 

"I  love  my  husband  —  never  forget  that,"  she 
would  warn  Graham,  and  within  the  minute  be  in 
his  arms. 

"  There  are  only  the  three  of  us  for  once,  thank 
goodness,"  Paula  cried,  seizing  Dick  and  Graham 
by  the  hands  and  leading  them  toward  Dick's  fav 
orite  lounging  couch  in  the  big  room.  "  Come,  let 
us  sit  upon  the  ground  and  tell  sad  stories  of  the 
deaths  of  kings.  Come,  milords,  and  lordly  per- 
ishers,  and  we  will  talk  of  Armageddon  when  the  last 
sun  goes  down." 

She  was  in  a  merry  mood,  and  with  surprise  Dick 
observed  her  light  a  cigarette.  He  could  count  on 
his  fingers  the  cigarettes  she  had  smoked  in  a  dozen 
years,  and  then,  only  under  a  hostess's  provocation 
to  give  countenance  to  some  smoking  woman  guest. 
Later,  when  he  mixed  a  highball  for  himself  and 
Graham,  she  again  surprised  him  by  asking  him  to 
mix  her  a  "  wee  "  one. 

"  This  is  Scotch,"  he  warned. 

"  Oh,  a  very  wee  one,"  she  insisted,  "  and  then 
we'll  be  three  good  fellows  together,  winding  up 
the  world.  And  when  you've  got  it  all  wound  up 
and  ready,  I'll  sing  you  the  song  of  the  Valkyries." 

She  took  more  part  in  the  talk  than  usual,  and 
strove  to  draw  her  husband  out.  Nor  was  Dick 
unaware  of  this,  although  he  yielded  and  permitted 
himself  to  let  go  full  tilt  on  the  theme  of  the  blond 
sun-perishers. 

She  is  trying  to  make  him  compete  —  was 
Graham's  thought.  But  Paula  scarcely  thought  of 


324  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

that  phase  of  it,  her  pleasure  consisting  in  the  spec 
tacle  of  two  such  splendid  men  who  were  hers. 
They  talk  of  big  game  hunting,  she  mused  once  to 
herself;  but  did  ever  one  small  woman  capture  bigger 
game  than  this? 

She  sat  cross-legged  on  the  couch,  where,  by  a 
turn  of  the  head,  she  could  view  Graham  lounging 
comfortably  in  the  big  chair,  or  Dick,  on  his  elbow, 
sprawled  among  the  cushions.  And  ever,  as  they 
talked,  her  eyes  roved  from  one  to  the  other ;  and,  as 
they  spoke  of  struggle  and  battle,  always  in  the  cold 
iron  terms  of  realists,  her  own  thoughts  became  so 
colored,  until  she  could  look  coolly  at  Dick  with  no 
further  urge  of  the  pity  that  had  intermittently  ached 
her  heart  for  days. 

She  was  proud  of  him  —  a  goodly,  eye-filling 
figure  of  a  man  to  any  woman;  but  she  no  longer  felt 
sorry  for  him.  They  were  right.  It  was  a  game. 
The  race  was  to  the  swift,  the  battle  to  the  strong. 
They  had  run  such  races,  fought  such  battles.  Then 
why  not  she?  And  as  she  continued  to  look,  that 
self-query  became  reiterant. 

They  were  not  anchorites,  these  two  men.  Lib 
eral-lived  they  must  have  been  in  that  past  out  of 
which,  like  mysteries,  they  had  come  to  her.  They 
had  had  the  days  and  nights  that  women  were  de 
nied  —  women  such  as  she.  As  for  Dick,  beyond  all 
doubt  —  even  had  she  heard  whispers  —  there  had 
been  other  women  in  that  wild  career  of  his  over  the 
world.  Men  were  men,  and  they  were  two  such 
men.  She  felt  a  burn  of  jealousy  against  those  un- 
v  known  women  who  must  have  been,  and  her  heart 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  325 

hardened.     They  had  taken  their  fun  where  they 
found  it  —  Kipling's  line  ran  through  her  head. 

Pity?     Why  should  she  pity,  any  more  than  she 
should  be  pitied?     The  whole  thing  was  too  big,  too 
natural,  for  pity.     They  were  taking  a  hand  in  a 
big  game,   and  all  could  not  be  winners.     Playing 
with  the  fancy,  she  wandered  on  to  a  consideration 
of  the  outcome.     Always  she  had  avoided  such  con-N 
sideration,  but  the  tiny  highball  had  given  her  dar-  / 
ing.     It  came  to  her  that  she  saw  doom  ahead,  doom  j 
vague  and  formless  but  terrible. 

She  was  brought  back  to  herself  by  Dick's  hand 
before  her  eyes  and  apparently  plucking  from  the 
empty  air  the  something  upon  which  she  steadfastly 
stared. 

"  Seeing  things?  "  he  teased,  as  her  eyes  turned  to 
meet  his. 

His  were  laughing,  but  she  glimpsed  in  them  what, 
despite  herself,  made  her  veil  her  own  with  her  long 
lashes.  He  knew.  Beyond  all  possibility  of  error 
she  knew  now  that  he  knew.  That  was  what  she 
had  seen  in  his  eyes  and  what  had  made  her  veil  her 


own. 

a  < 


Cynthia,  Cynthia,  I've  been  a-thinking,'  "  she 
gayly  hummed  to  him;  and,  as  he  resumed  his  talk, 
she  reached  and  took  a  sip  from  his  part-empty 
glass. 

Let  come  what  would,  she  asserted  to  herself,  she 
would  play  it  out.  It  was  all  a  madness,  but  it  was 
life,  it  was  living.  She  had  never  so  lived  before, 
and  it  was  worth  it,  no  matter  what  inevitable  pay 
ment  must  be  made  in  the  end.  Love  ?  —  had  she 


326  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

ever  really  loved  Dick  as  she  now  felt  herself  capable 
of  loving?  Had  she  mistaken  the  fondness  of  affec 
tion  for  love  all  these  years?  Her  eyes  warmed  as 
they  rested  on  Graham,  and  she  admitted  that  he 
had  swept  her  as  Dick  never  had. 

Unused  to  alcohol  in  such  strength,  her  heart 
was  accelerated;  and  Dick,  with  casual  glances,  noted 
and  knew  the  cause  of  the  added  brilliance,  the 
flushed  vividness  of  cheeks  and  lips. 

He  talked  less  and  less,  and  the  discussion  of  the 
sun-perishers  died  of  mutual  agreement  as  to  its 
facts.  Finally,  glancing  at  his  watch,  he  straight 
ened  up,  yawned,  stretched  his  arms  and  announced : 

"  Bed-time  he  stop.  Head  belong  this  fellow 
white  man  too  much  sleepy  along  him. —  Night 
cap,  Evan?  " 

Graham  nodded,  for  both  felt  the  need  of  a  stif- 
fener. 

"Mrs.  Toper  —  nightcap?"  Dick  queried  of 
Paula. 

But  she  shook  her  head  and  busied  herself  at  the 
piano  putting  away  the  music,  while  the  men  had 
their  drink. 

Graham  closed  down  the  piano  for  her,  while 
Dick  waited  in  the  doorway,  so  that  when  they  left 
he  led  them  by  a  dozen  feet.  As  they  came  along, 
Graham,  under  her  instructions,  turned  off  the  lights 
in  the  halls.  Dick  waited  where  the  ways  diverged 
and  where  Graham  would  have  to  say  good  night 
on  his  way  to  the  tower  room. 

The  one  remaining  light  was  turned  off. 

"  Oh,  not  that  one,  silly,"  Dick  heard  Paula  cry 
out.  "  We  keep  it  on  all  night." 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  327 

Dick  heard  nothing,  but  the  dark  was  fervent  to 
him.  He  cursed  himself  for  his  own  past  embraces 
in  the  dark,  for  so  the  wisdom  was  given  him  to 
know  the  quick  embrace  that  had  occurred,  ere,  the 
next  moment,  the  light  flashed  on  again. 

He  found  himself  lacking  the  courage  to  look 
at  their  faces  as  they  came  toward  him.  He  did  not 
want  to  see  Paula's  frank  eyes  veiled  by  her  lashes, 
and  he  fumbled  to  light  a  cigarette  while  he  cudgeled 
his  wits  for  the  wording  of  an  ordinary  good  night. 

"  How  goes  the  book?  —  what  chapter?"  he 
called  after  Graham  down  his  hall,  as  Paula  put  her 
hand  in  his. 

Her  hand  in  his,  swinging  his,  hopping  and  skip 
ping  and  all  a-chatter  in  simulation  of  a  little  girl 
with  a  grown-up,  Paula  went  on  with  Dick;  while 
he  sadly  pondered  what  ruse  she  had  in  mind  by 
which  to  avoid  the  long-avoided,  good  night  kiss. 

Evidently  she  had  not  found  it  when  they  reached 
the  dividing  of  the  ways  that  led  to  her  quarters  and 
to  his.  Still  swinging  his  hand,  still  buoyantly  chat 
tering  fun,  she  continued  with  him  into  his  work 
room.  Here  he  surrendered.  He  had  neither 
heart  nor  energy  to  wait  for  her  to  develop  whatever 
she  contemplated. 

He  feigned  sudden  recollection,  deflected  her  by 
the  hand  to  his  desk,  and  picked  up  a  letter. 

"  Td  promised  myself  to  get  a  reply  off  on  the 
first  machine  in  the  morning,"  he  explained,  as  he 
pressed  on  the  phonograph  and  began  dictating. 

For  a  paragraph  she  still  held  his  hand.  Then 
he  felt  the  parting  pressure  of  her  fingers  and  her 
whispered  good  night 


328  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  Good  night,  little  woman/'  he  answered  me 
chanically,  and  continued  dictating  as  if  oblivious  to 
her  going. 

Nor  did  he  cease  until  he  knew  she  was  well  out 
of  hearing. 


CHAPTER  XXVIII 

A  DOZEN  times  that  morning,  dictating  to 
Blake  or  indicating  answers,  Dick  had  been 
on  the  verge  of  saying  to  let  the  rest  of  the 
correspondence  go. 

"  Call  up  Hennessy  and  Mendenhall,"  he  told 
Blake,  when,  at  ten,  the  latter  gathered  up  his  notes 
and  rose  to  go.  "  You  ought  to  catch  them  at  the 
stallion  barn.  Tell  them  not  to  come  this  morning 
but  to-morrow  morning." 

Bonbright  entered,  prepared  to  shorthand  Dick's 
conversations  with  his  managers  for  the  next  hour. 

"  And  —  oh,  Mr.  Blake,"  Dick  called.  "Ask 
Hennessy  about  Alden  Bessie. —  The  old  mare  was 
pretty  bad  last  night,"  he  explained  to  Bonbright. 

"  Mr.  Hanley  must  see  you  right  away,  Mr.  For 
rest,"  Bonbright  said,  and  added,  at  sight  of  the 
irritated  drawing  up  of  his  employer's  brows,  "  It's 
the  piping  from  Buckeye  Dam.  Something's  wrong 
with  the  plans  —  a  serious  mistake,  he  says." 

Dick  surrendered,  and  for  an  hour  discussed  ranch 
business  with  his  foremen  and  managers. 

Once,  in  the  middle  of  a  hot  discussion  over  sheep- 
dips  with  Wardman,  he  left  his  desk  and  paced  over 
to  the  window.  The  sound  of  voices  and  horses, 
and  of  Paula's  laugh,  had  attracted  him. 

4  Take  that  Montana  report  —  I'll  send  you  a 
329 


330  THE  LITTLE  LADY 


copy    to-day,' '    he    continued,    as    he    gazed    out. 
"  They  found  the  formula  didn't  get  down  to  it.     It 
was    more    a    sedative    than    a    germicide.     Therel 
wasn't  enough  kick  in  it  .  .  ." 

Four  horses,  bunched,  crossed  his  field  of  vision. 
Paula,  teasing  the  pair  of  them,  was  between 
Martinez  and  Froelig,  old  friends  of  Dick,  a  painter 
and  sculptor  respectively,  who  had  arrived  on  an 
early  train.  Graham,  on  Selim,  made  the  fourth, 
and  was  slightly  edged  toward  the  rear.  So  the 
party  went  by,  but  Dick  reflected  that  quickly  enough 
it  would  resolve  itself  into  two  and  two. 

Shortly  after  eleven,  restless  and  moody,  he  wan-  ? 
dered  out  with  a  cigarette  into  the  big  patio,  where  j 
he  smiled  grim  amusement  at  the  various  tell-tale 
signs  of  Paula's  neglect  of  her  goldfish.     The  sight 
of  them  suggested  her  secret  patio  in  whose  fountain  > 
pools    she    kept   her   selected   and   more    gorgeous 
blooms  of  fish.     Thither  he  went,  through  doors 
without  knobs,  by  ways  known  only  to  Paula  and  the 
servants. 

This  had  been  Dick's  one  great  gift  to  Paula.  It 
was  love-lavish  as  only  a  king  of  fortune  could  make 
it.  He  had  given  her  a  free  hand  with  it,  and  in 
sisted  on  her  wildest  extravagance;  and  it  had  been 
his  delight  to  tease  his  quondam  guardians  with  the 
stubs  of  the  checkbook  she  had  used.  It  bore  no 
relation  to  the  scheme  and  architecture  of  the  Big 
House,  and,  for  that  matter,  so  deeply  hidden  was  it 
that  it  played  no  part  in  jar  of  line  or  color.  A 
show-place  of  show-places,  it  was  not  often  shown. 
Outside  Paula's  sisters  and  intimates,  on  rare  oc 
casions  some  artist  was  permitted  to  enter  and  catch 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  331 

his  breath.  Graham  had  heard  of  its  existence,  but 
not  even  him  had  she  invited  to  see. 

It  was  round,  and  small  enough  to  escape  giving 
any  cold  hint  of  spaciousness.  The  Big  House  was 
of  sturdy  concrete,  but  here  was  marble  in  exquisite 
delicacy.  The  arches  of  the  encircling  arcade  were 
of  fretted  white  marble  that  had  taken  on  just 
enough  tender  green  to  prevent  any  glare  of  reflected 
light.  Palest  of  pink  roses  bloomed  up  the  pillars 
and  over  the  low  flat  roof  they  upheld,  where  Puck- 
like,  humorous,  and  happy  faces  took  the  place  of 
grinning  gargoyles.  Dick  strolled  the  rosy  marble 
pavement  of  the  arcade  and  let  the  beauty  of 
the  place  slowly  steal  in  upon  him  and  gentle  his 
mood. 

The  heart  and  key  of  the  fairy  patio  was  the 
fountain,  consisting  of  three  related  shallow  basins 
at  different  levels,  of  white  marble  and  delicate  as 
shell.  Over  these  basins  rollicked  and  frolicked  life- 
sized  babies  wrought  from  pink  marble  by  no  mean 
hand.  Some  peered  over  the  edges  into  lower 
basins,  one  reached  arms  covetously  toward  the  gold 
fish;  one,  on  his  back,  laughed  at  the  sky,  another 
stood  with  dimpled  legs  apart  stretching  himself, 
others  waded,  others  were  on  the  ground  amongst 
the  roses  white  and  blush,  but  all  were  of  the  foun 
tain  and  touched  it  at  some  point.  So  good  was  the 
color  of  the  marble,  so  true  had  been  the  sculptor, 
that  the  illusion  was  of  life.  No  cherubs  these,  but 
live  warm  human  babies. 

Dick  regarded  the  rosy  fellowship  pleasantly  and 
long,  finishing  his  cigarette  and  retaining  it  dead  in 
his  hand.  That  was  what  she  had  needed,  he 


332  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

mused  —  babies,  children.     It  had  been  her  passicnl 
Had  she  realized  it  ...  He  sighed,   and,   stri 
by  a  fresh  thought,  looked  to  her  favorite  seat  with 
certitude  that  he  would  not  see  the  customary  sew 
ing  lying  on  it  in  a  pretty  heap.     She  did  not  s( 
these  days. 

He  did  not  enter  the  tiny  gallery  behind  the  £ 
cade,  which  contained  her  chosen  paintings  and  etci 
ings,  and  copies  in  marble  and  bronze  of  her  favor 
ites  of  the  European  galleries.     Instead  he  went  v 
the  stairway,  past  the  glorious  Winged  Victory  c 
the  landing  where  the  staircase  divided,  and  on  ant 
up  into  her  quarters  that  occupied  the  entire  uppei 
wing.     But  first,  pausing  by  the  Victory,  he  turned 
and  gazed  down  into  the  fairy  patio.     The  thing 
was  a  cut  jewel  in  its  perfectness  and  color,  and  he 
acknowledged,  although  he  had  made  it  possible  for 
her,  that  it  was  entirely  her  own  creation  —  her  one 
masterpiece.     It  had  long  been  her  dream,  and  he 
had  realized  it  for  her.     And  yet  now,  he  meditated, 
it  meant  nothing  to  her.     She  was  not  mercenary, 
that  he  knew;  and  if  he  could  not  hold  her,  mere 
baubles  such  as  that  would  weigh  nothing  in  the  bal 
ance  against  her  heart. 

He  wandered  idly  through  her  rooms,  scarcely 
noting  at  what  he  gazed,  but  gazing  with  fondness 
at  it  all.  Like  everything  else  of  hers,  it  was  dis 
tinctive,  different,  eloquent  of  her.  But  when  he 
glanced  into  the  bathroom  with  its  sunken  Roman 
bath,  for  the  life  of  him  he  was  unable  to  avoid  see 
ing  a  tiny  drip  and  making  a  mental  note  for  the 
ranch  plumber. 

As  a  matter  of  course,  he  looked  to  her  easel  with 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  333 

rJ»?  expectation  of  finding  no  new  work,  but  was  dis- 
c     jointed;  for  a  portrait  of  himself  confronted  him. 
He  knew  her  trick  of  copying  the  pose  and  lines  from 
photograph  and  filling  in  from  memory.     The  par- 
'Ular  photograph  she  was  using  had  been  a  for- 
late  snapshop  of  him  on  horseback.     The  Out- 
tf,  ror  once  and  for  a  moment,  had  been  at  peace, 
Jj?d  Dick,  hat  in  hand,  hair  just  nicely  rumpled,  face 
7,  repose,  unaware  of  the  impending  snap,  had  at 
fe  instant  looked  squarely  into  the  camera.     No 
^rtrait  photographer  could  have  caught  a  better 
Mceness.     The  head  and  shoulders  Paula  had  had 
nlarged,  and  it  was  from  this  that  she  was  working. 
3ut  the  portrait  had  already  gone  beyond  the  photo 
graph,  for  Dick  could  see  her  own  touches. 

With  a  start  he  looked  more  closely.  Was  that 
expression  of  the  eyes,  of  the  whole  face,  his?  He 
glanced  at  the  photograph.  It  was  not  there.  He 
walked  over  to  one  of  the  mirrors,  relaxed  his  face, 
and  led  his  thoughts  to  Paula  and  Graham.  Slowly 
the  expression  came  into  his  eyes  and  face.  Not 
content,  he  returned  to  the  easel  and  verified  it. 
Paula  knew.  Paula  knew  that  he  knew.  She  had 
learned  it  from  him,  stolen  it  from  him  some  time 
when  it  was  unwittingly  on  his  face,  and  carried  it  in 
her  memory  to  the  canvas. 

Paula's  Chinese  maid,  Oh  Dear,  entered  from  the 
wardrobe  room,  and  Dick  watched  her  unobserved 
as  she  came  down  the  room  toward  him.  Her  eyes 
were  down,  and  she  seemed  deep  in  thought.  Dick 
remarked  the  sadness  of  her  face,  and  that  the  little, 
solicitous  contraction  of  the  brows  that  had  led  to 
her  naming  was  gone.  She  was  not  solicitous,  that 


334  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

was  patent.  But  cast  down,  she  was,  in  heavy  de 
pression. 

It  would  seem  that  all  our  faces  are  beginning  to 
say  things,  he  commented  to  himself. 

"  Good  morning,  Oh  Dear,"  he  startled  her. 

And  as  she  returned  the  greeting,  he  saw  compas 
sion  in  her  eyes  as  they  dwelt  on  him.  She  knew. 
The  first  outside  themselves.  Trust  her,  a  worn'*"?, 
so  much  in  Paula's  company  when  Paula  was  alone, 
to  divine  Paula's  secret. 

Oh  Dear's  lips  trembled,  and  she  wrung  her 
trembling  hands,  nerving  herself,  as  he  could  see,  to 
speech. 

"  Mister  Forrest,"  she  began  haltingly,  "  maybe 
you  think  me  fool,  but  I  like  say  something.  You 
very  kind  man.  You  very  kind  my  old  mother. 
You  very  kind  me  long  long  time  .  .  ." 

She  hesitated,  moistening  her  frightened  lips  with 
her  tongue,  then  braved  her  eyes  to  his  and  pro 
ceeded. 

"  Mrs.  Forrest,  she,  I  think  .  .  ." 

But  so  forbidding  did  Dick's  face  become  that  she 
broke  off  in  confusion  and  blushed,  as  Dick  sur 
mised,  with  shame  at  the  thoughts  she  had  been 
about  to  utter. 

"  Very  nice  picture  Mrs.  Forrest  make,"  he  put 
her  at  her  ease. 

The  Chinese  girl  sighed,  and  the  same  compas 
sion  returned  into  her  eyes  as  she  looked  long  at 
Dick's  portrait. 

She  sighed  again,  but  the  coldness  in  her  voice 
was  not  lost  on  Dick  as  she  answered :  "  Yes,  very 
nice  picture  Mrs.  Forrest  make." 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  335 

She  looked  at  him  with  sudden  sharp  scrutiny, 
studying  his  face,  then  turned  to  the  canvas  and 
pointed  at  the  eyes. 

"  No  good,"  she  condemned. 

Her  voice  was  harsh,  touched  with  anger. 

"  No  good,"  she  flung  over  her  shoulder,  more 
loudly,  still  more  harshly,  as  she  continued  down 
the  room  and  out  of  sight  on  Paula's  sleeping  porch. 

Dick  -stiffened  his  shoulders,  unconsciously  brac 
ing  himself  to  face  what  was  now  soon  to  happen. 
Well,  it  was  the  beginning  of  the  end.  Oh  Dear 
knew.  Soon  more  would  know,  all  would  know. 
And  in  a  way  he  was  glad  of  it,  glad  that  the  torment 
of  suspense  would  endure  but  little  longer. 

But  when  he  started  to  leave  he  whistled  a  merry 
jingle  to  advertise  to  Oh  Dear  that  the  world 
wagged  very  well  with  him  so  far  as  he  knew  any 
thing  about  it. 

The  same  afternoon,  while  Dick  was  out  and  away 
with  Froelig  and  Martinez  and  Graham,  Paula 
stole  a  pilgrimage  to  Dick's  quarters.  Out  on  his 
sleeping  porch  she  looked  over  his  rows  of  press 
buttons,  his  switchboard  that  from  his  bed  connected 
him  with  every  part  of  the  ranch  and  most  of  the 
rest  of  California,  his  phonograph  on  the  hinged  and 
swinging  bracket,  the  orderly  array  of  books  and 
magazines  and  agricultural  bulletins  waiting  to  be 
read,  the  ash  tray,  cigarettes,  scribble  pads,  and 
thermos  bottle. 

Her  photograph,  the  only  picture  on  the  porch, 
held  her  attention.  It  hung  under  his  barometers 
and  thermometers,  which,  she  knew,  was  where  he 


336  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

looked  oftenest.  A  fancy  came  to  her,  and  she 
turned  the  laughing  face  to  the  wall  and  glanced 
from  the  blankness  of  the  back  of  the  frame  to  the 
bed  and  back  again.  With  a  quick  panic  movement, 
she  turned  the  laughing  face  out.  It  belonged,  was 
her  thought;  it  did  belong. 

The  big  automatic  pistol  in  the  holster  on  the 
wall,  handy  to  one's  hand  from  the  bed,  caught  her 
eye.  She  reached  to  it  and  lifted  gently  at  the  butt. 
It  was  as  she  had  expected  —  loose  —  Dick's  way. 
Trust  him,  no  matter  how  long  unused,  never  to  let 
a  pistol  freeze  in  its  holster. 

Back  in  the  work  room  she  wandered  solemnly 
about,  glancing  now  at  the  prodigious  filing  system, 
at  the  chart  and  blue-print  cabinets,  at  the  revolving 
shelves  of  reference  books,  and  at  the  long  rows  of 
stoutly  bound  herd  registers.  At  last  she  came  to 
his  books  —  a  goodly  row  of  pamphlets,  bound  mag 
azine  articles,  and  an  even  dozen  ambitious 
tomes.  She  read  the  titles  painstakingly:  "  Corn 
in  California,"  "  Silage  Practice,"  "  Farm  Organiza 
tion,  "  Farm  Book-keeping,"  u  The  Shire  in  Amer 
ica,"  "  Humus  Destruction,"  "Soilage,"  "Alfalfa 
in  California,"  "  Cover  Crops  for  California," 
"  The  Shorthorn  in  America  "  —  at  this  last  she 
smiled  affectionately  with  memory  of  the  great  con 
troversy  he  had  waged  for  the  beef  cow  and  the 
milch  cow  as  against  the  dual  purpose  cow. 

She  caressed  the  backs  of  the  books  with  her 
palm,  pressed  her  cheek  against  them  and  leaned 
with  closed  eyes.  Oh,  Dick,  Dick  —  a  thought  be 
gan  that  faded  to  a  vagueness  of  sorrow  and  died 
because  she  did  not  dare  to  think  it. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  337 

The  desk  was  so  typically  Dick.  There  was  no 
litter.  Clean  it  was  of  all  work  save  the  wire  tray 
with  typed  letters  waiting  his  signature  and  an  un 
usual  pile  of  the  flat  yellow  sheets  on  which  his  sec 
retaries  typed  the  telegrams  relayed  by  telephone 
from  Eldorado.  Carelessly  she  ran  her  eyes  over 
the  opening  lines  of  the  uppermost  sheet  and 
chanced  upon  a  reference  that  puzzled  and  interested 
her.  She  read  closely,  with  in-drawn  brows,  then 
went  deeper  into  the  heap  till  she  found  confirma 
tion.  Jeremy  Braxton  was  dead  —  big,  genial, 
kindly  Jeremy  Braxton.  A  Mexican  mob  of  pulque- 
crazed  peons  had  killed  him  in  the  mountains 
through  which  he  had  been  trying  to  escape  from  the 
Harvest  into  Arizona.  The  date  of  the  telegram 
was  two  days  old.  Dick  had  known  it  for  two  days 
and  never  worried  her  with  it.  And  it  meant  more. 
It  meant  money.  It  meant  that  the  affairs  of  the 
Harvest  Group  were  going  from  bad  to  worse. 
And  it  was  Dick's  way. 

And  Jeremy  was  dead.  The  room  seemed  sud 
denly  to  have  grown  cold.  She  shivered.  It  was 
the  way  of  life  —  death  always  at  the  end  of  the 
road.  And  her  own  nameless  dread  came  back  upon 
her.  Doom  lay  ahead.  Doom  for  whom?  She 
did  not  attempt  to  guess.  Sufficient  that  it  was 
doom.  Her  mind  was  heavy  with  it,  and  the  quiet 
room  was  heavy  with  it  as  she  passed  slowly  out. 


CHAPTER  XXIX 

"TT1IS  a  birdlike  sensuousness  that  is  all  the 
I  Little  Lady's  own,"  Terrence  was  saying, 
as  he  helped  himself  to  a  cocktail  from 
the  tray  Ah  Ha  was  passing  around. 

It  was  the  hour  before  dinner,  and  Graham,  Leo 
and  Terrence  McFane  had  chanced  together  in  the 
stag-room. 

"  No,  Leo/'  the  Irishman  warned  the  young  poet. 
"  Let  the  one  suffice  you.  Your  cheeks  are  warm 
with  it.  A  second  one  and  you'll  conflagrate.  'Tis 
no  right  you  have  to  be  mixing  beauty  and  strong 
drink  in  that  lad's  head  of  yours.  Leave  the  drink 
to  your  elders.  There  is  such  a  thing  as  con 
sanguinity  for  drink.  You  have  it  not.  As  for 
me—" 

He  emptied  the  glass  and  paused  to  turn  the  cock 
tail  reminiscently  on  his  tongue. 

"  'Tis  women's  drink,"  he  shook  his  head  in  con 
demnation.  "  It  likes  me  not.  It  bites  me  not. 
And  devil  a  bit  of  a  taste  is  there  to  it. —  Ah  Ha, 
my  boy,"  he  called  to  the  Chinese,  "  mix  me  a  high 
ball  in  a  long,  long  glass  —  a  stiff  one." 

He  held  up  four  fingers  horizontally  to  indicate 
the  measure  of  liquor  he  would  have  in  the  glass, 
and,  to  Ah  Ha's  query  as  to  what  kind  of  whiskey, 
answered,  "  Scotch  or  Irish,  bourbon  or  rye  — 
whichever  comes  nearest  to  hand." 

Graham  shook  his  head  to  the  Chinese,  and 

338 

.. 


THE  LITTLE  LADY  339 

laughed  to  the  Irishman.  "  You'll  never  drink  me 
down,  Terrence.  I've  not  forgotten  what  you  did 
to  O'Hay." 

"  'Twas  an  accident  I  would  have  you  think," 
was  the  reply.  '  They  say  when  a  man's  not  feel 
ing  any  too  fit  a  bit  of  drink  will  hit  him  like  a  club." 

"  And  you?  "  Graham  questioned. 

"  Have  never  been  hit  by  a  club.  I  am  a  man  of 
singularly  few  experiences." 

"  But,  Terrence,  you  were  saying  .  .  .  about 
Mrs.  Forrest?"  Leo  begged.  "  It  sounded  as  if  it 
were  going  to  be  nice." 

"  As  if  it  could  be  otherwise,"  Terrence  censured. 
"  But  as  I  was  saying,  'tis  a  bird-like  sensuousness  — 
oh,  not  the  little,  hoppy,  wagtail  kind,  nor  yet  the 
sleek  and  solemn  dove,  but  a  merry  sort  of  bird,  like 
the  wild  canaries  you  see  bathing  in  the  fountains, 
always  twittering  and  singing,  flinging  the  water  in 
the  sun,  and  glowing  the  golden  hearts  of  them  on 
their  happy  breasts.  'Tis  like  that  the  Little  Lady 
is.  I  have  observed  her  much. 

"  Everything  on  the  earth  and  under  the  earth 
and  in  the  sky  contributes  to  the  passion  of  her  days 
—  the  untoward  purple  of  the  ground  myrtle  when 
it  has  no  right  to  aught  more  than  pale  lavender,  a 
single  red  rose  tossing  in  the  bathing  wind,  one  per 
fect  Duchesse  rose  bursting  from  its  bush  into  the 
sunshine,  as  she  said  to  me,  '  pink  as  the  dawn,  Ter 
rence,  and  shaped  like  a  kiss.' 

"  'Tis  all  one  with  her  —  the  Princess's  silver 
neigh,  the  sheep  bells  of  a  frosty  morn,  the  pretty 
Angora  goats  making  silky  pictures  on  the  hillside 
all  day  long,  the  drifts  of  purple  lupins  along  the 


340  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

fences,  the  long  hot  grass  on  slope  and  roadside,  the 
summer-burnt  hills  tawny  as  crouching  lions  —  and 
even  have  I  seen  the  sheer  sensuous  pleasure  of  the 
Little  Lady  with  bathing  her  arms  and  neck  in  the 
blessed  sun." 

"  She  is  the  soul  of  beauty,"  Leo  murmured. 
"  One  understands  how  men  can  die  for  women 
such  as  she." 

"  And  how  men  can  live  for  them,  and  love  them, 
the  lovely  things,"  Terrence  added.  "  Listen,  Mr. 
Graham,  and  I'll  tell  you  a  secret.  We  philosophers 
of  the  madrono  grove,  we  wrecks  and  wastages  of 
life  here  in  the  quiet  backwater  and  easement  of 
Dick's  munificence,  are  a  brotherhood  of  lovers. 
And  the  lady  of  our  hearts  is  all  the  one  —  the  Lit 
tle  Lady.  We,  who  merely  talk  and  dream  our  days 
away,  and  who  would  lift  never  a  hand  for  God, 
or  country,  or  the  devil,  are  pledged  knights  of  the 
Little  Lady." 

"  We  would  die  for  her,"  Leo  affirmed,  slowly 
nodding  his  head. 

"  Nay,  lad,  we  would  live  for  her  and  fight  for 
her,  dying  is  that  easy." 

Graham  missed  nothing  of  it.  The  boy  did  not 
understand,  but  in  the  blue  eyes  of  the  Celt,  peering 
from  under  the  mop  of  iron-gray  hair,  there  was  no 
mistaking  the  knowledge  of  the  situation. 

Voices  of  men  were  heard  coming  down  the  stairs, 
and,  as  Martinez  and  Dar  Hyal  entered,  Terrence 
was  saying: 

"  'Tis  fine  weather  they  say  they're  having  down 
at  Catalina  now,  and  I  hear  the  tunny  fish  are  biting 
splendid." 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  341 

Ah  Ha  served  cocktails  around,  and  was  kept 
busy,  for  Hancock  and  Froelig  followed  along. 
Terrence  impartially  drank  stiff  highballs  of  what 
ever  liquor  the  immobile-faced  Chinese  elected  to 
serve  him,  and  discoursed  fatherly  to  Leo  on  the 
iniquities  and  abominations  of  the  flowing  bowl. 

Oh  My  entered,  a  folded  note  in  his  hand,  and 
looked  about  in  doubt  as  to  whom  to  give  it. 

"  Hither,  wing-heeled  Celestial,"  Terrence  waved 
him  up. 

"  'Tis  a  petition,  couched  in  very  proper  terms," 
Terrence  explained,  after  a  glance  at  its  contents. 
"  And  Ernestine  and  Lute  have  arrived,  for  'tis  they 
that  petition.  Listen."  And  he  read:  "  *  Oh, 
noble  and  glorious  stags,  two  poor  and  lowly  meek- 
eyed  does,  wandering  lonely  in  the  forest,  do  humbly 
entreat  admission  for  the  brief  time  before  dinner 
to  the  stamping  ground  of  the  herd.' 

'  The  metaphor  is  mixed,"  said  Terrence.  '  Yet 
have  they  acted  well.  'Tis  the  rule  —  Dick's  rule 
—  and  a  good  rule  it  is :  no  petticoats  in  the  stag- 
room  save  by  the  stags'  unanimous  consent.—  Is 
the  herd  ready  for  the  question?  All  those  in  favor 
will  say  '  Aye.' —  Contrary  minded? —  The  ayes 
have  it. 

"  Oh  My,  fleet  with  thy  heels  and  bring  in  the 
ladies." 

"  '  With  sandals  beaten  from  the  crowns  of 
kings,'  '  Leo  added,  murmuring  the  words  rever 
ently,  loving  them  with  his  lips  as  his  lips  formed 
them  and  uttered  them. 

"  c  Shall  he  tread  down  the  altars  of  their  night,'  " 
Terrence  completed  the  passage.  *  The  man  who 


34*  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

wrote  that  is  a  great  man.  He  is  Leo's  friend,  and 
Dick's  friend,  and  proud  am  I  that  he  is  my  friend." 

"  And  that  other  line,"  Leo  said.  "  From  the 
same  sonnet,"  he  explained  to  Graham.  "  Listen 
to  the  sound  of  it:  *  To  hear  what  song  the  star  of 
morning  sings' — oh,  listen,"  the  boy  went  on,  his 
voice  hushed  low  with  beauty-love  for  the  words: 
"  '  With  perished  beauty  in  his  hands  as  clay,  Shall 
he  restore  futurity  its  dream  — '  " 

He  broke  off  as  Paula's  sisters  entered,  and  rose 
shyly  to  greet  them. 

Dinner  that  night  was  as  any  dinner  at  which  the 
madrono  sages  were  present.  Dick  was  as  robustly 
controversial  as  usual,  locking  horns  with  Aaron 
Hancock  on  Bergson,  attacking  the  latter's  meta 
physics  in  sharp  realistic  fashion. 

'  Your  Bergson  is  a  charlatan  philosopher, 
Aaron,"  Dick  concluded.  "  He  has  the  same  old 
medicine-man's  bag  of  metaphysical  tricks,  all  decked 
out  and  frilled  with  the  latest  ascertained  facts  of 


science." 


'Tis  true,"  Terrence  agreed.  "  Bergson  is  a 
charlatan  thinker.  'Tis  why  he  is  so  popular — " 

"  I  deny  — "  Hancock  broke  in. 

"  Wait  a  wee,  Aaron.  'Tis  a  thought  I  have 
glimmered.  Let  me  catch  it  before  it  flutters  away 
into  the  azure.  Dick's  caught  Bergson  with  the 
goods  on  him,  filched  straight  from  the  treasure- 
house  of  science.  His  very  cocksureness  is  filched 
from  Darwin's  morality  of  strength  based  on  the  sur 
vival  of  the  fittest.  And  what  did  Bergson  do  with 
it?  Touched  it  up  with  a  bit  of  James'  prag- 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  343 

matism,  rosied  it  over  with  the  eternal  hope  in  man's 
breast  that  he  will  live  again,  and  made  it  all  a-shine 
with  Nietzsche's  '  nothing  succeeds  like  excess  — ' 

'*  Wilde's,  you  mean,"  corrected  Ernestine. 

"  Heaven  knows  I  should  have  filched  it  for  my 
self  had  you  not  been  present,"  Terrence  sighed, 
with  a  bow  to  her.  "  Some  day  the  antiquarians 
will  decide  the  authorship.  Personally  I  would  say 
it  smacked  of  Methuselah —  But  as  I  was  saying, 
before  I  was  delightfully  interrupted  .  .  ." 

4  Who  more  cocksure  than  Dick?"  Aaron  was 
challenging  a  little  later ;  while  Paula  glanced  signifi 
cantly  to  Graham. 

"  I  was  looking  at  the  herd  of  yearling  stallions 
but  yesterday,"  Terrence  replied,  "  and  with  the 
picture  of  the  splendid  beasties  still  in  my  eyes  I'll 
ask:  And  who  more  delivers  the  goods?" 

"  But  Hancock's  objection  is  solid,"  Martinez  ven 
tured.  "  It  would  be  a  mean  and  profitless  world 
.without  mystery.  Dick  sees  no  mystery." 

*  There  you  wrong  him,"  Terrence  defended. 
"  I  know  him  well.  Dick  recognizes  mystery,  but 
not  of  the  nursery-child  variety.  No  cock-and-bull 
stories  for  him,  such  as  you  romanticists  luxuriate 


in." 


1  Terrence  gets  me,"  Dick  nodded.  '  The  world 
will  always  be  mystery.  To  me  man's  conscious 
ness  is  no  greater  mystery  than  the  reaction  of  the 
gases  that  make  a  simple  drop  of  water.  Grant 
that  mystery,  and  all  the  more  complicated  phenom 
ena  cease  to  be  mysteries.  That  simple  chemical 
reaction  is  like  one  of  the  axioms  on  which  the  edifice 
of  geometry  is  reared.  Matter  and  force  are  the 


344  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

everlasting  mysteries,  manifesting  themselves  in  the 
twin  mysteries  of  space  and  time.  The  manifesta 
tions  are  not  mysteries  —  only  the  stuff  of  the  mani 
festations,  matter  and  force;  and  the  theater  of  the 
manifestations,  space  and  time." 

Dick  ceased  and  idly  watched  the  expressionless 
Ah  Ha  and  Ah  Me  who  chanced  at  the  moment  to 
be  serving  opposite  him.  Their  faces  did  not  talk, 
was  his  thought;  although  ten  to  one  was  a  fair  bet 
that  they  were  informed  with  the  same  knowledge 
that  had  perturbed  Oh  Dear. 

"  And  there  you  are,"  Terrence  was  triumphing. 

'Tis  the  perfect  joy  of  him  —  never  up  in  the  air 
with  dizzy  heels.  Flat  on  the  good  ground  he 
stands,  four  square  to  fact  and  law,  set  against  all 
airy  fancies  and  bubbly  speculations.  ..." 

And  as  at  table,  so  afterward  that  evening  no  one 
could  have  guessed  from  Dick  that  all  was  not  well 
with  him.  He  seemed  bent  on  celebrating  Lute's 
and  Ernestine's  return,  refused  to  tolerate  the  heavy 
talk  of  the  philosophers,  and  bubbled  over  with 
pranks  and  tricks.  Paula  yielded  to  the  contagion, 
and  aided  and  abetted  him  in  his  practical  jokes 
which  none  escaped. 

Choicest  among  these  was  the  kiss  of  welcome. 
No  man  escaped  it.  To  Graham  was  accorded  the 
honor  of  receiving  it  first  so  that  he  might  witness 
the  discomfiture  of  the  others,  who,  one  by  one,  were 
ushered  in  by  Dick  from  the  patio. 

Hancock,  Dick's  arm  guiding  him,  came  down  the 
room  to  confront  Paula  and  her  sisters  standing  in 
a  row  on  three  chairs  in  the  middle  of  the  floor.  He 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  345 

scanned  them  suspiciously,  and  insisted  upon  walk 
ing  around  behind  them.  But  there  seemed  noth 
ing  unusual  about  them  save  that  each  wore  a  man's 
felt  hat. 

"  Looks  good  to  me,"  Hancock  announced,  as  he 
stood  on  the  floor  before  them  and  looked  up  at 
them. 

"  And  it  is  good,"  Dick  assured  him.  "  As  rep 
resenting  the  ranch  in  its  fairest  aspects,  they  are  to 
administer  the  kiss  of  welcome.  Make  your  choice, 
Aaron." 

Aaron,  with  a  quick  whirl  to  catch  some  possible 
lurking  disaster  at  his  back,  demanded,  "  They  are 
all  three  to  kiss  me?  " 

"  No,  make  your  choice  which  is  to  give  you  the 
kiss." 

"  The  two  I  do  not  choose  will  not  feel  that  I  have 
discriminated  against  them?"  Aaron  insisted. 

"  Whiskers  no  objection?  "  was  his  next  query. 

"  Not  in  the  way  at  all,"  Lute  told  him.  "  I  have 
always  wondered  what  it  would  be  like  to  kiss  black 
whiskers." 

"  Here's  where  all  the  philosophers  get  kissed  to 
night,  so  hurry  up,"  Ernestine  said.  'The  others 
are  waiting.  I,  too,  have  yet  to  be  kissed  by  an 
alfalfa  field." 

"  Whom  do  you  choose?  "  Dick  urged. 

"  As  if,  after  that,  there  were  any  choice  about  it," 
Hancock  returned  jauntily.  "  I  kiss  my  lady  —  the 
Little  Lady." 

As  he  put  up  his  lips,  Paula  bent  her  head  for 
ward,  and,  nicely  directed,  from  the  indented  crown 
of  her  hat  canted  a  glassful  of  water  into  his  face. 


346  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

When  Leo's  turn  came,  he  bravely  made  his  choice 
of  Paula  and  nearly  spoiled  the  show  by  reverently 
bending  and  kissing  the  hem  of  her  gown. 

"  It  will  never  do,"  Ernestine  told  him.  "  It 
must  be  a  real  kiss.  Put  up  your  lips  to  be  kissed." 

"  Let  the  last  be  first  and  kiss  me,  Leo,"  Lute 
begged,  to  save  him  from  his  embarrassment. 

He  looked  his  gratitude,  put  up  his  lips,  but  with 
out  enough  tilt  of  his  head,  so  that  he  received  the 
water  from  Lute's  hat  down  the  back  of  his  neck. 

"  All  three  shall  kiss  me  and  thus  shall  paradise  be 
thrice  multiplied,"  was  Terrence's  way  out  of  the 
difficulty;  and  simultaneously  he  received  three 
crowns  of  water  for  his  gallantry. 

Dick's  boisterousness  waxed  apace.  His  was  the 
most  care-free  seeming  in  the  world  as  he  measured 
Froelig  and  Martinez  against  the  door  to  settle  the 
dispute  that  had  arisen  as  to  whether  Froelig  or 
Martinez  was  the  taller. 

"  Knees  straight  and  together,  heads  back,"  Dick 
commanded. 

And  as  their  heads  touched  the  wood,  from  the 
other  side  came  a  rousing  thump  that  jarred  them. 
The  door  swung  open,  revealing  Ernestine  with  a 
padded  gong-stick  in  either  hand. 

Dick,  a  high-heeled  satin  slipper  in  his  hand,  was 
under  a  sheet  with  Terrence,  teaching  him  "  Brother 
Bob  I'm  bobbed"  to  the  uproarious  joy  of  the 
others,  when  the  Masons  and  Watsons  and  all  their 
Wickenberg  following  entered  upon  the  scene. 

Whereupon  Dick  insisted  that  the  young  men  of 
their  party  receive  the  kiss  of  welcome.  Nor  did  he 
miss,  in  the  hubbub  of  a  dozen  persons  meeting  as 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  347 

many  more,  Lottie  Mason's:  "  Oh,  good  evening, 
Mr.  Graham.  I  thought  you  had  gone." 

And  Dick,  in  the  midst  of  the  confusion  of  set 
tling  such  an  influx  of  guests,  still  maintaining  his  ex 
uberant  jolly  pose,  waited  for  that  sharp  scrutiny 
that  women  have  only  for  women.  Not  many  mo 
ments  later  he  saw  Lottie  Mason  steal  such  a  look, 
keen  with  speculation,  at  Paula  as  she  chanced  face 
to  face  with  Graham,  saying  something  to  him. 

Not  yet,  was  Dick's  conclusion.  Lottie  did  not 
know.  But  suspicion  was  rife,  and  nothing,  he  was 
certain,  under  the  circumstances,  would  gladden  her 
woman's  heart  more  than  to  discover  the  unimpeach 
able  Paula  as  womanly  weak  as  herself. 

Lottie  Mason  was  a  tall,  striking  brunette  of 
twenty-five,  undeniably  beautiful,  and,  as  Dick  had 
learned,  undeniably  daring.  In  the  not  remote  past, 
attracted  by  her,  and,  it  must  be  submitted,  subtly  in 
vited  by  her,  he  had  been  guilty  of  a  philandering 
that  he  had  not  allowed  to  go  as  far  as  her  wishes. 
The  thing  had  not  been  serious  on  his  part.  Nor 
had  he  permitted  it  to  become  serious  on  her  side. 
Nevertheless,  sufficient  flirtatious  passages  had  taken 
place  to  impel  him  this  night  to  look  to  her,  rather 
than  to  the  other  Wickenberg  women,  for  the  first 
signals  of  suspicion. 

"  Oh,  yes,  he's  a  beautiful  dancer,"  Dick,  as  he 
came  up  to  them  half  an  hour  later,  heard  Lottie 
Mason  telling  little  Miss  Maxwell.  "  Isn't  he, 
Dick?"  she  appealed  to  him,  with  innocent  eyes  of 
candor  through  which  disguise  he  knew  she  was 
studying  him. 

"  Who  ?  —  Graham,    you    must   mean,"    he    an- 


348  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

swered  with  untroubled  directness.  "  He  certainly 
is.  What  do  you  say  we  start  dancing  and  let  Miss 
Maxwell  see  ?  Though  there's  only  one  woman  here 
who  can  give  him  full  swing  to  show  his  paces." 

"  Paula,  of  course/'  said  Lottie. 

"  Paula,  of  course.  Why,  you  young  chits  don't 
know  how  to  waltz.  You  never  had  a  chance  to 
learn." —  Lottie  tossed  her  fine  head.  "  Perhaps 
you  learned  a  little  before  the  new  dancing  came  in," 
he  amended.  "  Anyway,  I'll  get  Evan  and  Paula 
started,  you  take  me  on,  and  I'll  wager  we'll  be  the 
only  couples  on  the  floor." 

Half  through  the  waltz,  he  broke  it  off  with: 
"  Let  them  have  the  floor  to  themselves.  It's  worth 
seeing." 

And,  glowing  with  appreciation,  he  stood  and 
watched  his  wife  and  Graham  finish  the  dance,  while 
he  knew  that  Lottie,  beside  him,  stealing  side  glances 
at  him,  was  having  her  suspicions  allayed. 

The  dancing  became  general,  and,  the  evening 
being  warm,  the  big  doors  to  the  patio  were  thrown 
open.  Now  one  couple,  and  now  another,  danced 
out  and  down  the  long  arcades  where  the  moonlight 
streamed,  until  it  became  the  general  thing. 

"  What  a  boy  he  is,"  Paula  said  to  Graham,  as 
they  listened  to  Dick  descanting  to  all  and  sundry 
on  the  virtues  of  his  new  night  camera.  '  You 
heard  Aaron  complaining  at  table,  and  Terrence  ex 
plaining,  his  sureness.  Nothing  terrible  has  ever 
happened  to  him  in  his  life.  He  has  never  been 
overthrown.  His  sureness  has  always  been  vindi 
cated.  As  Terrence  said,  it  has  always  delivered 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  349 

the  goods.  He  does  know,  he  does  know,  and  yet 
he  is  so  sure  of  himself,  so  sure  of  me." 

Graham  taken  away  to  dance  with  Miss  Max 
well,  Paula  continued  her  train  of  thought  to  her 
self.  Dick  was  not  suffering  so  much  after  all. 
And  she  might  have  expected  it.  He  was  the  cool- 
head,  the  philosopher.  He  would  take  her  loss  with 
the  same  equanimity  as  he  would  take  the  loss  of 
Mountain  Lad,  as  he  had  taken  the  death  of  Jeremy 
Braxton  and  the  flooding  of  the  Harvest  mines.  It 
was  difficult,  she  smiled  to  herself,  aflame  as  she 
was  toward  Graham,  to  be  married  to  a  philosopher 
who  would  not  lift  a  hand  to  hold  her.  And  it 
came  to  her  afresh  that  one  phase  of  Graham's 
charm  for  her  was  his  humanness,  his  flamingness. 
They  met  on  common  ground.  At  any  rate,  even 
in  the  heyday  of  their  coming  together  in  Paris, 
Dick  had  not  so  inflamed  her.  A  wonderful  lover 
he  had  been,  too,  with  his  gift  of  speech  and  lover's 
phrases,  with  his  love-chants  that  had  so  delighted 
her;  but  somehow  it  was  different  from  this  what  she 
felt  for  Graham  and  what  Graham  must  feel  for  her. 
Besides,  she  had  been  most  young  in  experience  of 
love  and  lovers  in  that  long  ago  when  Dick  had  burst 
so  magnificently  upon  her. 

And  so  thinking,  she  hardened  toward  him  and 
recklessly  permitted  herself  to  flame  toward  Gra 
ham.  The  crowd,  the  gayety,  the  excitement,  the 
closeness  and  tenderness  of  contact  in  the  dancing, 
the  summer-warm  of  the  evening,  the  streaming 
moonlight,  and  the  night-scents  of  flowers  —  all 
fanned  her  ardency,  and  she  looked  forward  eagerly 


350  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

to  the  at  least  one  more  dance  she  might  dare  with 
Graham. 

"  No  flash  light  is  necessary,"  Dick  was  explain 
ing.  "  It's  a  German  invention.  Half  a  minute  ex 
posure  under  the  ordinary  lighting  is  sufficient.  And 
the  best  of  it  is  that  the  plate  can  be  immediately  de 
veloped  just  like  an  ordinary  blue  print.  Of  course, 
the  drawback  is  one  cannot  print  from  the  plate." 

"  But  if  it's  good,  an  ordinary  plate  can  be  copied 
from  it  from  which  prints  can  be  made,"  Ernestine 
amplified. 

She  knew  the  huge,  twenty-foot,  spring  snake 
coiled  inside  the  camera  and  ready  to  leap  out  like 
a  jack-in-the-box  when  Dick  squeezed  the  bulb. 
And  there  were  others  who  knew  and  who  urged 
Dick  to  get  the  camera  and  make  an  exposure. 

He  was  gone  longer  than  he  expected,  for  Bon- 
bright  had  left  on  his  desk  several  telegrams  con 
cerning  the  Mexican  situation  that  needed  immediate 
replies.  Trick  camera  in  hand,  Dick  returned  by  a 
short  cut  across  the  house  and  patio.  The  dancing 
couples  were  ebbing  down  the  arcade  and  disappear 
ing  into  the  hall,  and  he  leaned  against  a  pillar  and 
watched  them  go  by.  Last  of  all  came  Paula  and 
Evan,  passing  so  close  that  he  could  have  reached  out 
and  touched  them.  But,  though  the  moon  shone  full 
on  him,  they  did  not  see  him.  They  saw  only  each 
other  in  the  tender  sport  of  gazing. 

The  last  preceding  couple  was  already  inside  when 
the  music  ceased.  Graham  and  Paula  paused,  and 
he  was  for  giving  her  his  arm  and  leading  her  inside, 
but  she  clung  to  him  in  sudden  impulse.  Man-like, 
cautious,  'he  slightly  resisted  for  a  moment,  but  with 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  351 

one  arm  around  his  neck  she  drew  his  head  willingly 
down  to  the  kiss.  It  was  a  flash  of  quick  passion. 
The  next  instant,  Paula  on  his  arm,  they  were  pass 
ing  in  and  Paula's  laugh  was  ringing  merrily  and 
naturally. 

Dick  clutched  at  the  pillar  and  eased  himself  down 
abruptly  until  he  sat  flat  on  the  pavement.  Accom 
panying  violent  suffocation,  or  causing  it,  his  heart 
seemed  rising  in  his  chest.  He  panted  for  air.  The 
cursed  thing  rose  and  choked  and  stifled  him  un 
til,  in  the  grim  turn  his  fancy  took,  it  seemed  to  him 
that  he  chewed  it  between  his  teeth  and  gulped  it 
back  and  down  his  throat  along  with  the  reviving  air. 
He  felt  chilled,  and  was  aware  that  he  was  wet  with 
sudden  sweat. 

"  And  who  ever  heard- of  heart  disease  in  the  For- 
rests  ?  "  he  muttered,  as,  still  sitting,  leaning  against 
the  pillar  for  support,  he  mopped  his  face  dry.  His 
hand  was  shaking,  and  he  felt  a  slight  nausea  from 
an  internal  quivering  that  still  persisted. 

It  was  not  as  if  Graham  had  kissed  her,  he  pon 
dered.  It  was  Paula  who  had  kissed  Graham. 
That  was  love,  and  passion.  He  had  seen  it,  and 
as  it  burned  again  before  his  eyes,  he  felt  his  heart 
surge,  and  the  premonitory  sensation  of  suffocation 
seized  him.  With  a  sharp  effort  of  will  he  con 
trolled  himself  and  got  to  his  feet. 

"  By  God,  it  came  up  in  my  mouth  and  I  chewed 
it,"  he  muttered.  "  I  chewed  it." 

Returning  across  the  patio  by  the  round-about 
way,  he  entered  the  lighted  room  jauntily  enough, 
camera  in  hand,  and  unprepared  for  the  reception  he 
received. 


352  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  Seen  a  ghost?  "  Lute  greeted. 

"Are  you  sick?" — "  What's  the  matter?"  were 
other  questions. 

"  What  is  the  matter?  "  he  countered. 
1  Your  face  —  the   look  of  it,"   Ernestine  said. 
"  Something  has  happened.     What  is  it?  " 

And  while  he  oriented  himself  he  did  not  fail  to 
note  Lottie  Mason's  quick  glance  at  the  faces  of  Gra 
ham  and  Paula,  nor  to  note  that  Ernestine  had  ob 
served  Lottie's  glance  and  followed  it  up  for  her 
self. 

"  Yes,"  he  lied.  "  Bad  news.  Just  got  the  word. 
Jeremy  Braxton  is  dead.  Murdered.  The  Mexi 
cans  got  him  while  he  was  trying  to  escape  into  Ari 


zona." 


"  Old  Jeremy,  God  love  him  for  the  fine  man  he 
was,"  Terrence  said,  tucking  his  arm  in  Dick's. 
"  Come  on,  old  man,  'tis  a  stiffener  you're  wanting 
and  I'm  the  lad  to  lead  you  to  it." 

"  Oh,  I'm  all  right,"  Dick  smiled,  shaking  his 
shoulders  and  squaring  himself  as  if  gathering  him 
self  together.  "  It  did  hit  me  hard  for  the  moment. 
I  hadn't  a  doubt  in  the  world  but  Jeremy  would  make 
it  out  all  right.  But  they  got  him,  and  two  engi 
neers  with  him.  They  put  up  a  devil  of  a  fight  first. 
They  got  under  a  cliff  and  stood  off  a  mob  of  half 
a  thousand  for  a  day  and  night.  And  then  the 
Mexicans  tossed  dynamite  down  from  above.  Oh, 
well,  all  flesh  is  grass,  and  there  is  no  grass  of  yes 
teryear.  Terrence,  your  suggestion  is  a  good  one. 
Lead  on." 

After  a  few  steps  he  turned  his  head  over  his 
shoulder  and  called  back:  "  Now  this  isn't  to  stop 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  353 

the  fun.  I'll  be  right  back  to  take  that  photograph. 
You  arrange  the  group,  Ernestine,  and  be  sure  to 
have  them  under  the  strongest  light." 

Terrence  pressed  open  the  concealed  buffet  at  the 
far  end  of  the  room  and  set  out  the  glasses,  while 
Dick  turned  on  a  wall  light  and  studied  his  face  in 
the  small  mirror  inside  the  buffet  door. 

"  It's  all  right  now,  quite  natural,"  he  announced. 

"  'Twas  only  a  passing  shade,"  Terrence  agreed, 
pouring  the  whiskey.  "  And  man  has  well  the  right 
to  take  it  hard  the  going  of  old  friends." 

They  toasted  and  drank  silently. 

"  Another  one,"  Dick  said,  extending  his  glass. 

"  Say  *  when,'  "  said  the  Irishman,  and  with  im 
perturbable  eyes  he  watched  the  rising  tide  of  liquor 
in  the  glass. 

Dick  waited  till  it  was  half  full. 

Again  they  toasted  and  drank  silently,  eyes  to  eyes, 
and  Dick  was  grateful  for  the  offer  of  all  his  heart 
that  he  read  in  Terrence's  eyes. 

Back  in  the  middle  of  the  hall,  Ernestine  was  gayly 
grouping  the  victims,  and  privily,  from  the  faces 
of  Lottie,  Paula,  and  Graham,  trying  to  learn  more 
of  the  something  untoward  that  she  sensed.  Why 
had  Lottie  looked  so  immediately  and  searchingly 
at  Graham  and  Paula  ?  —  she  asked  herself.  And 
something  was  wrong  with  Paula  now.  She  was 
worried,  disturbed,  and  not  in  the  way  to  be  ex 
pected  from  the  announcement  of  Jeremy  Braxton's 
death.  From  Graham,  Ernestine  could  glean  noth 
ing.  He  was  quite  his  ordinary  self,  his  facetious- 
ness  the  cause  of  much  laughter  to  Miss  Maxwell 
and  Mrs.  Watson. 


354  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

Paula  was  disturbed.  What  had  happened? 
Why  had  Dick  lied?  He  had  known  of  Jeremy's 
death  for  two  days.  And  she  had  never  known  any 
body's  death  so  to  affect  him.  She  wondered  if  he 
had  been  drinking  unduly.  In  the  course  of  their 
married  life  she  had  seen  him  several  times  in  liquor. 
He  carried  it  well,  the  only  noticeable  effects  being 
a  flush  in  his  eyes  and  a  loosening  of  his  tongue  to 
whimsical  fancies  and  extemporized  chants.  Had 
he,  in  his  trouble,  been  drinking  with  the  iron-headed 
Terrence  down  in  the  stag  room?  She  had  found 
them  all  assembled  there  just  before  dinner.  The 
real  cause  for  Dick's  strangeness  never  crossed  her 
mind,  if,  for  no  other  reason,  than  that  he  was  not 
given  to  spying. 

He  came  back,  laughing  heartily  at  a  joke  of  Ter- 
rence's,  and  beckoned  Graham  to  join  them  while 
Terrence  repeated  it.  And  when  the  three  had  had 
their  laugh,  he  prepared  to  take  the  picture.  The 
burst  of  the  huge  snake  from  the  camera  and  the 
genuine  screams  of  the  startled  women  served  to  dis 
pel  the  gloom  that  threatened,  and  next  Dick  was 
arranging  a  tournament  of  peanut-carrying. 

From  chair  to  chair,  placed  a  dozen  yards  apart, 
the  feat  was  with  a  table  knife  to  carry  the  most 
peanuts  in  five  minutes.  After  the  preliminary  try- 
out,  Dick  chose  Paula  for  his  partner,  and  chal 
lenged  the  world,  Wickenberg  and  the  madrono 
grove  included.  Many  boxes  of  candy  were  wa 
gered,  and  in  the  end  he  and  Paula  won  out  against 
Graham  and  Ernestine,  who  had  proved  the  next 
best  couple.  Demands  for  a  speech  changed  to 
clamor  for  a  peanut  song.  Dick  complied,  beating 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  355 

the  accent,  Indian  fashion,  with  stiff-legged  hops 
and  hand-slaps  on  thighs. 

"  I  am  Dick  Forrest,  son  of  Richard  the  Lucky, 
Son  of  Jonathan  the  Puritan,  son  of  John  who  was 
a  sea-rover,  as  his  father  Albert  before  him,  who 
was  the  son  of  Mortimer,  a  pirate  who  was  hanged 
in  chains  and  died  without  issue. 

"  I  am  the  last  of  the  Forrests,  but  first  of  the 
peanut-carriers.  Neither  Nimrod  nor  Sandow  has 
anything  on  me.  I  carry  the  peanuts  on  a  knife,  a 
silver  knife.  The  peanuts  are  animated  by  the  devil. 
I  carry  the  peanuts  with  grace  and  celerity  and  in 
quantity.  The  peanut  never  sprouted  that  can  best 
me. 

"  The  peanuts  roll.  The  peanuts  roll.  Like  At 
las  who  holds  the  world,  I  never  let  them  fall.  Not 
every  one  can  carry  peanuts.  I  am  God-gifted.  I 
am  master  of  the  art.  It  is  a  fine  art.  The  peanuts 
roll,  the  peanuts  roll,  and  I  carry  them  on  forever. 

"  Aaron  is  a  philosopher.  He  cannot  carry  pea 
nuts.  Ernestine  is  a  blonde.  She  cannot  carry 
peanuts.  Evan  is  a  sportsman.  He  drops  pea 
nuts.  Paula  is  my  partner.  She  fumbles  peanuts. 
Only  I,  I,  by  the  grace  of  God  and  my  own  clever 
ness,  carry  peanuts. 

'  When  anybody  has  had  enough  of  my  song, 
throw  something  at  me.  I  am  proud.  I  am  tire 
less.  I  can  sing  on  forever.  I  shall  sing  on  for 
ever. 

"  Here  beginneth  the  second  canto.  When  I  die, 
bury  me  in  a  peanut  patch.  While  I  live  — 

The  expected  avalanche  of  cushions  quenched  his 
song  but  not  his  ebullient  spirits,  for  he  was  soon 


356  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

in  a  corner  with  Lottie  Mason  and  Paula  concoct 
ing  a  conspiracy  against  Terrence. 

And  so  the  evening  continued  to  be  danced  and 
joked  and  played  away.  At  midnight  supper  was 
served,  and  not  till  two  in  the  morning  were  the 
Wickenbergers  ready  to  depart.  While  they  were 
getting  on  their  wraps,  Paula  was  proposing  for  the 
following  afternoon  a  trip  down  to  the  Sacramento 
River  to  look  over  Dick's  experiment  in  rice-raising. 

"  I  had  something  else  in  view,"  he  told  her. 
"  You  know  the  mountain  pasture  above  Sycamore 
Creek.  Three  yearlings  have  been  killed  there  in 
the  last  ten  days." 

"  Mountain  lions!  "  Paula  cried. 

"  Two  at  least. —  Strayed  in  from  the  north,"  he 
explained  to  Graham.  '  They  sometimes  do  that. 
We  got  three  five  years  ago. —  Moss  and  Hartley 
will  be  there  with  the  dogs  waiting.  They've  lo 
cated  two  of  the  beasts.  What  do  you  say  all  of 
you  join  me.  We  can  leave  right  after  lunch." 

"  Let  me  have  Mollie?  "  Lute  asked. 

"  And  you  can  ride  Altadena,"  Paula  told  Ernes 
tine. 

Quickly  the  mounts  were  decided  upon,  Froelig 
and  Martinez  agreeing  to  go,  but  promising  neither 
to  shoot  well  nor  ride  well. 

All  went  out  to  see  the  Wickenbergers  off,  and, 
after  the  machines  were  gone,  lingered  to  make  ar 
rangements  for  the  hunting. 

"  Good  night,  everybody,"  Dick  said,  as  they 
started  to  move  inside.  "  I'm  going  to  take  a  look 
at  Alden  Bessie  before  I  turn  in.  Hennessy  is  sit 
ting  up  with  her.  Remember,  you  girls,  come  to 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  357 

lunch  in  your  riding  togs,  and  curses  on  the  head  of 
whoever's  late." 

The  ancient  dam  of  the  Fotherington  Princess 
was  in  a  serious  way,  but  Dick  would  not  have  made 
the  visit  at  such  an  hour,  save  that  he  wanted  to  be 
by  himself  and  that  he  could  not  nerve  himself  for 
a  chance  moment  alone  with  Paula  so  soon  after 
what  he  had  overseen  in  the  patio. 

Light  steps  in  the  gravel  made  him  turn  his  head. 
Ernestine  caught  up  with  him  and  took  his  arm. 

"  Poor  old  Alden  Bessie,"  she  explained.  "  I 
thought  I'd  go  along." 

Dick,  still  acting  up  to  his  night's  role,  recalled 
to  her  various  funny  incidents  of  the  evening,  and 
laughed  and  chuckled  with  reminiscent  glee. 

"  Dick,"  she  said  in  the  first  pause,  "  you  are  in 
trouble."  She  could  feel  him  stiffen,  and  hurried 
on:  ;'  What  can  I  do?  You  know  you  can  depend 
on  me.  Tell  me." 

"  Yes,  I'll  tell  you,"  he  answered.  "  Just  one 
thing."  She  pressed  his  arm  gratefully.  "  I'll  have' 
a  telegram  sent  you  to-morrow.  It  will  be  urgent 
enough,  though  not  too  serious.  You  will  just  bun 
dle  up  and  depart  with  Lute." 

"  Is  that  all?"  she  faltered. 

"  It  will  be  a  great  favor." 

"  You  won't  talk  with  me?  "  she  protested,  quiv 
ering  under  the  rebuff. 

"  I'll  have  the  telegram  come  so  as  to  rout  you  out 
of  bed.  And  now  never  mind  Alden  Bessie.  You 
run  a  long  in.  Good  night." 

He  kissed  her,  gently  thrust  her  toward  the  house, 
and  went  on  his  way. 


CHAPTER  XXX 

ON  the  way  back  from  the  sick  mare,   Dick 
paused  once  to  listen  to  the  restless  stamp  of 
Mountain  Lad  and  his  fellows  in  the  stallion 
barn.     In  the   quiet  air,    from   somewhere  up  the 
hills,  came  the  ringing  of  a  single  bell  from  some 
grazing  animal.     A  cat's-paw  of  breeze  fanned  him 
with    sudden   balmy   warmth.     All   the    night   was 
balmy  with  the  faint  and  almost  aromatic  scent  of 
Opening    grain    and    drying    grass.     The    stallion 
/stamped  again,  and  Dick,  with  a  deep  breath  and 
I  realization  that  never  had  he  more  loved  it  all,  looked 
I   up  and  circled  the  sky-line  where  the  crests  of  the 
mountains  blotted  the  field  of  stars. 

"  No,  Cato,"  he  mused  aloud.  "  One  cannot 
agree  with  you.  Man  does  not  depart  from  life  as 
from  an  inn.  He  departs  as  from  a  dwelling,  the 
one  dwelling  he  will  ever  know.  He  departs  .  .  . 
nowhere.  It  is  good  night.  For  him  the  Noiseless 
One  .  .  .  and  the  dark." 

He  made  as  if  to  start,  but  once  again  the  stamp 
of  the  stallions  held  him,  and  the  hillside  bell  rang 
out.  He  drew  a  deep  inhalation  through  his  nos 
trils  of  the  air  of  balm,  and  loved  it,  and  loved  the 
fair  land  of  his  devising. 

"  *  I  looked  into  time  and  saw  none  of  me  there,'  ' 
he  quoted,  then  capped  it,  smiling,  with  a  second 

358 


THE  LITTLE  LADY  359 

quotation:     "  '  She   gat   me   nine   great  sons.   .  .  . 
The  other  nine  were  daughters.'  ' 

Back  at  the  house,  he  did  not  immediately  go  in, 
but  stood  a  space  gazing  at  the  far  flung  lines  of 
it.     Nor,  inside,  did  he  immediately  go  to  his  own 
quarters.     Instead,  he  wandered  through  the  silent 
rooms,  across  the  patios,  and  along  the  dim-liHraibv^ 
His  frame  of  mind  was  as  of  one  about  to  depart  ^ 
on  a  journey.     He  pressed  on  the  lights  in  Paula's/ 
fairy  patio,  and,  sitting  in  an  austere  Roman  seat  of 
marble,  smoked  a  cigarette  quite  through  while  he 
made  his  plans. 

Oh,  he  would  do  it  nicely  enough.  He  could  pull 
off  a  hunting  accident  that  would  fool  the  world. 
Trust  him  not  to  bungle  it.  Next  day  would  be 
the  day,  in  the  woods  above  Sycamore  Creek. 
Grandfather  Jonathan  Forrest,  the  straight-laced 
Puritan,  had  died  of  a  hunting  accident.  For  the 
first  time  Dick  doubted  that  accident.  Well,  if  it 
hadn't  been  an  accident,  the  old  fellow  had  done  it 
well.  It  had  never  been  hinted  in  the  family  that 
it  was  aught  but  an  accident. 

His  hand  on  the  button  to  turn  off  the  lights, 
Dick  delayed  a  moment  for  a  last  look  at  the  mar 
ble  babies  that  played  in  the  fountain  and  among  the 
roses. 

"  So  long,  younglings,"  he  called  softly  to  them. 
"  You're  the  nearest  I  ever  came  to  it." 

From  his  sleeping  porch  he  looked  across  t 
patio  to  Paula's  porch.     There  was  no  light.     The 
chance  was  she  slept. 

On  the  edge  of  the  bed,  he  found  himself  with  one 
shoe  unlaced,  and,  smiling  at  his  absentness,  relaced 


360  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

it.  What  need  was  there  for  him  to  sleep?  It 
was  already  four  in  the  morning.  He  would  at  least 
watch  his  last  sunrise.  Last  things  were  coming 
fast.  Already  had  he  not  dressed  for  the  last  time  ? 
And  the  bath  of  the  previous  morning  would  be  his 
last.  Mere  water  could  not  stay  the  corruption  of 
death.  He  would  have  to  shave,  however  —  a  last 
vanity,  for  the  hair  did  continue  to  grow  for  a  time 
on  dead  men's  faces. 

He  brought  a  copy  of  his  will  from  the  wall-safe 
to  his  desk  and  read  it  carefully.  Several  minor 
codicils  suggested  themselves,  and  he  wrote  them  out 
in  long-hand,  pre-dating  them  six  months  as  a  precau 
tion.  The  last  was  the  endowment  of  the  sages  of 
the* madrono  grove  with  a  fellowship  of  seven. 

He  ran  through  his  life  insurance  policies,  veri 
fying  the  permitted  suicide  clause  in  each  one ;  signed 
the  tray  of  letters  that  had  waited  his  signature 
since  the  previous  morning;  and  dictated  a  letter 
into  the  phonograph  to  the  publisher  of  his  books. 
His  desk  cleaned,  he  scrawled  a  quick  summary  of 
income  and  expense,  with  all  earnings  from  the 
Harvest  mines  deducted.  He  transposed  the  sum 
mary  into  a  second  summary,  increasing  the  expense 
margins,  and  cutting  down  the  income  items  to  an 
absurdest  least  possible.  Still  the  result  was  satis 
factory. 

He  tore  up  the  sheets  of  figures  and  wrote  out  a 
program  for  the  future  handling  of  the  Harvest  sit 
uation.  He  did  it  sketchily,  with  casual  tentative- 
ness,  so  that  when  it  was  found  among  the  papers 
there  would  be  no  suspicions.  In  the  same  fash- 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  361 

ion  he  worked  out  a  line-breeding  program  for  the 
Shires,  and  an  in-breeding  table,  up  and  down,  for 
Mountain  Lad  and  the  Fotherington  Princess  and 
certain  selected  individuals  of  their  progeny. 

When  Oh  Myxcame  in  with  coffee  at  six,  Dick 
was  on  his  last  paragraph  of  his  scheme  for  rice- 
growing. 

"  Although  the  Italian  rice  may  be  worth  experi 
menting  with  for  quick  maturity,"  he  wrote, 
shall  for  a  time  confine  the  main  plantings  in  equal 
proportions  to  Moti,  loko,  and  the  Wateribune. 
Thus,  with  different  times  of  maturing,  the  same 
crews  and  the  same  machinery,  with  the  same  over 
head,  can  work  a  larger  acreage  than  if  only  one  va 
riety  is  planted." 

Oh  My  served  the  coffee  at  his  desk,  and  made 
no  sign  even  after  a  glance  to  the  porch  at  the  bed 
which  had  not  been  slept  in  —  all  of  which  control 
Dick  permitted  himself  privily  to  admire. 

At  six-thirty  the  telephone  rang  and  he  heard 
Hennessy's  tired  voice:  "  I  knew  you'd  be  up  and 
glad  to  know  Alden  Bessie's  pulled  through.  It 
was  a  squeak,  though.  And  now  it's  me  for  the 
hay." 

When  Dick  had  shaved,  he  looked  at  the  shower, 
hesitated  a  moment,  then  his  face  set  stubbornly. 
I'm  darned  if  I  will,  was  his  thought;  a  sheer  waste 
of  time.  He  did,  however,  change  his  shoes  to  a 
pair  of  heavy,  high-laced  ones  fit  for  the  roughness 
of  hunting. 

He  was  at  his  desk  again,  looking  over  the  notes 
in  his  scribble  pads  for  the  morning's  work,  when 


362  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

Paula  entered.  She  did  not  call  her  "  Good  morn 
ing,  merry  gentleman  " ;  but  came  quite  close  to  him 
before  she  greeted  him  softly  with: 

;'  The  Acorn-planter.  Ever  tireless,  never  weary 
Red  Cloud." 

He  noted  the  violet-blue  shadows  under  her  eyes, 
as  he  arose,  without  offering  to  touch  her.  Nor  did 
she  offer  invitation. 

"  A  white  night?  "  he  asked,  as  he  placed  a  chair. 

"  A  white  night,"  she  answered  wearily.  "  Not  a 
second's  sleep,  though  I  tried  so  hard." 

Both  were  reluctant  of  speech,  and  they  labored 
under  a  mutual  inability  to  draw  their  eyes  away 
from  each  other. 

4  You  .  .  .  you  don't  look  any  too  fit  yourself," 
she  said. 

*  Yes,  my  face,"  he  nodded.  "  I  was  looking  at 
it  while  I  shaved.  The  expression  won't  come  off." 

"  Something  happened  to  you  last  night,"  she 
probed,  and  he  could  not  fail  to  see  the  same  com 
passion  in  her  eyes  that  he  had  seen  in  Oh  Dear's. 
"  Everybody  remarked  your  expression.  What  was 
it?" 

He  shrugged  his  shoulders.  "  It  has  been  com 
ing  on  for  some  time,"  he  evaded,  remembering  that 
the  first  hint  of  it  had  been  given  him  by  Paula's 
portrait  of  him.  "  You've  noticed  it?  "  he  inquired 
casually. 

She  nodded,  then  was  struck  by  a  sudden  thought. 
He  saw  the  idea  leap  to  life  ere  her  words  uttered  it. 

"  Dick,  you  haven't  an  affair?  " 

It  was  a  way  out.  It  would  straighten  all  the  tan 
gle.  And  hope  was  in  her  voice  and  in  her  face. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  363 

He  smiled,  shook  his  head  slowly,  and  watched 
her  disappointment. 

"  I  take  it  back,"  he  said.     "  I  have  an  affair." 

"  Of  the  heart?" 

She  was  eager,  as  he  answered,  "  Of  the  heart." 

But  she  was  not  prepared  for  what  came  next. 
He  abruptly  drew  his  chair  close,  till  his  knees 
touched  hers,  and,  leaning  forward,  quickly  but 
gently  prisoned  her  hands  in  his  resting  on  her  knees. 

u  Don't  be  alarmed,  little  bird-woman,"  he  quieted 
her.  "  I  shall  not  kiss  you.  It  is  a  long  time  since 
I  have.  I  want  to  tell  you  about  that  affair.  But 
first  I  want  to  tell  you  how  proud  I  am  —  proud  of 
myself.  I  am  proud  tjiat  I  am  a  lover.  At  my 
age,  a  lover!  It  is  urioelievable,  and  it  is  wonder 
ful.  And  such  a  lover!  Such  a  curious,  unusual, 
and  quite  altogether  remarkable  lover.  In  fact,  I 
have  laughed  all  the  books  and  all  biology  in  the  face. 
I  am  a  monogamist.  I  love  the  woman,  the  one 
woman.  After  a  dozen  years  of  possession  I  love 
her  quite  madly,  oh,  so  sweetly  madly." 

Her  hands  communicated  her  disappointment  to 
him,  making  a  slight,  impulsive  flutter  to  escape ;  but 
he  held  them  more  firmly. 

"  I  know  her  every  weakness,  and,  weakness  and 
strength  and  all,  I  love  her  as  madly  as  I  loved  her 
at  the  first,  in  those  mad  moments  when  I  first  held 
her  in  my  arms." 

Her  hands  were  mutinous  of  the  restraint  he  put 
upon  them,  and  unconsciously  she  was  beginning  to 
pull  and  tug  to  be  away  from  him.  Also,  there  was 
fear  in  her  eyes.  He  knew  her  fastidiousness,  and 
he  guessed,  with  the  other  man's  lips  recent  on  hers, 


364  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

that  she  feared  a  more  ardent  expression  on  his  part. 

"  And  please,  please  be  not  frightened,  timid, 
sweet,  beautiful,  proud,  little  bird-woman.  See.  I 
release  you.  Know  that  I  love  you  most  dearly,  and 
that  I  am  considering  you  as  well  as  myself,  and  be 
fore  myself,  all  the  while." 

He  drew  his  chair  away  from  her,  leaned  back, 
and  saw  confidence  grow  in  her  eyes. 

"  I  shall  tell  you  all  my  heart,"  he  continued,  "  and 
I  shall  want  you  to  tell  me  all  your  heart." 

'  This  love  for  me  is  something  new?  "  she  asked. 
"  A  recrudescence  ?  " 

*  Yes,  a  recrudescence,  and  no." 

"  I  thought  that  for  a  long  time  I  had  been  a  habit 
to  you,"  she  said. 

"  But  I  was  loving  you  all  the  time." 

"  Not  madly." 

"  No,"  he  acknowledged.  "  But  with  certainty. 
I  was  so  sure  of  you,  of  myself.  It  was,  to  me,  all  a 
permanent  and  forever  established  thing.  I  plead 
guilty.  But  when  that  permanency  was  shaken,  all 
my  love  for  you  fired  up.  It  was  there  all  the  time, 
a  steady,  long-married  flame." 

"  But  about  me?  "  she  demanded. 

"  That  is  what  we  are  coming  to.  I  know  your 
worry  right  now,  and  of  a  minute  ago.  You  are  so 
intrinsically  honest,  so  intrinsically  true,  that  the 
thought  of  sharing  two  men  is  abhorrent  to  you.  I 
have  not  misread  you.  It  is  a  long  time  since  you 
have  permitted  me  any  love-touch."  He  shrugged 
his  shoulders  "  And  an  equally  long  time  since  I 
offered  you  a  love-touch." 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  365 

"  Then  you  have  known  from  the  first?"  she 
asked  quickly. 

He  nodded. 

"  Possibly,"  he  added,  with  an  air  of  judicious 
weighing,  "  I  sensed  it  coming  before  even  you  knew 
it.  But  we  will  not  go  into  that  or  other  things." 

"  You  have  seen  .  .  ."  she  attempted  to  ask, 
stung  almost  to  shame  at  thought  of  her  husband 
having  witnessed  any  caress  of  hers  and  Graham's. 

"  We  will  not  demean  ourselves  with  details, 
Paula.  Besides,  there  was  and  is  nothing  wrong 
about  any  of  it.  Also,  it  was  not  necessary  for  me 
to  see  anything.  I  have  my  memories  of  when  I, 
too,  kissed  stolen  kisses  in  the  pause  of  the  seconds 
between  the  frank,  outspoken  *  Good  nights.' 
When  all  the  signs  of  ripeness  are  visible  —  the  love- 
shades  and  love-notes  that  cannot  be  hidden,  the  un 
conscious  caress  of  the  eyes  in  a  fleeting  glance,  the 
involuntary  softening  of  voices,  the  cuckoo-sob  in 
the  throat  - —  why,  the  night-parting  kiss  does  not 
need  to  be  seen.  It  has  to  be.  Still  further,  oh 
my  woman,  know  that  I  justify  you  in  everything." 

"  It  ...  it  was  not  ever  .  .  .  much,"  she  fal 
tered. 

"  I  should  have  been  surprised  if  it  had  been.  It 
couldn't  have  been  you.  As  it  is,  I  have  been  sur 
prised.  After  our  dozen  years  it  was  unexpected— 

"  Dick,"  she  interrupted  him,  leaning  toward  him 
and  searching  him.  She  paused  to  frame  her 
thought,  and  then  went  on  with  directness.  :'  In  our 
dozen  years,  will  you  say  it  has  never  been  any  more 
with  you?  " 


366  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  I  have  told  you  that  I  justify  you  in  everything," 
he  softened  his  reply. 

"  But  you  have  not  answered  my  question/'  she  in 
sisted,  "  Oh,  I  do  not  mean  mere  flirtatious  pas 
sages,  bits  of  primrose  philandering.  I  mean  un 
faithfulness  and  I  mean  it  technically.  In  the  past 
you  have?  " 

"  In  the  past,"  he  answered,  "  not  much,  and  not 
for  a  long,  long  time." 

"  I  often  wondered,"  she  mused. 

"  And  I  have  told  you  I  justify  you  in  everything," 
he  reiterated.  "  And  now  you  know  where  lies  the 
justification." 

'"  Then  by  the  same  token  I  had  a  similar  right," 
said.  "  Though  I  haven't,  Dick,  I  haven't,"  she 
tastened  to  add.  "  Well,  anyway,  you  always  did 
preach  the  single  standard." 

"  Alas,  not  any  longer,"  he  smiled.  "  One's  im 
agination  will  conjure,  and  in  the  past  few  weeks  I've 
been  forced  to  change  my  mind." 

"  You  mean  that  you  demand  I  must  be  faithful?  " 

He  nodded  and  said,  "  So  long  as  you  live  with 


me." 


11  But  where's  the  equity?  " 

"  There  isn't  any  equity,"  he  shook  his  head. 
"  Oh,  I  know  it  seems  a  preposterous  change  of  view. 
But  at  this  late  day  I  have  made  the  discovery  of  the 
ancient  truth  that  women  are  different  from  men. 
All  I  have  learned  of  book  and  theory  goes  glim 
mering  before  the  everlasting  fact  that  the  women 
are  the  mothers  of  our  children.  I  ...  I  still  had 
my  hopes  of  children  with  you,  you  see.  But  that's 
all  over  and  done  with.  The  question  now  is, 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  367 

what's  in  your  heart?  I  have  told  you  mine.  And 
afterward  we  can  determine  what  is  to  be  done." 

"  Oh,  Dick,"  she  breathed,  after  silence  had 
grown  painful,  "  I  do  love  you,  I  shall  always  love 
you.  You  are  my  Red  Cloud.  Why,  do  you  know, 
only  yesterday,  out  on  your  sleeping  porch,  I  turned 
my  face  to  the  wall.  It  was  terrible.  It  didn't 
seem  right.  I  turned  it  out  again,  oh  so  quickly." 

He  lighted  a  cigarette  and  waited. 

"  But  you  have  not  told  me  what  is  in  your  heart, 
all  of  it,"  he  chided  finally. 

"  I  do  love  you,"  she  repeated. 

"  And  Evan?" 

"  That  is  different.  It  is  horrible  to  have  to  talk 
this  way  to  you.  Besides,  I  don't  know.  I  can't 
make  up  my  mind  what  is  in  my  heart." 

"Love?  Or  amorous  adventure?  It  must  be 
one  or  the  other." 

She  shook  her  head. 

"  Can't  you  understand?"  she  asked.  "That  I 
don't  understand?  You  see,  I  am  a  woman.  I 
have  never  sown  any  wild  oats.  And  now  that  all 
this  has  happened,  I  don't  know  what  to  make  of  it. 
Shaw  and  the  rest  must  be  right.  Women  are  hunt 
ing  animals.  You  are  both  big  game.  I  can't  help 
it.  It  is  a  challenge  to  me.  And  I  find  I  am  a  puz 
zle  to  myself.  All  my  concepts  have  been  toppled 
over  by  my  conduct.  I  want  you.  I  want  Evan.  I 
want  both  of  you.  It  is  not  amorous  adventure,  oh 
believe  me.  And  if  by  any  chance  it  is,  and  I  do 
not  know  it  —  no,  it  isn't,  I  know  it  isn't." 

"  Then  it  is  love." 

"  But  I  do  love  you,  Red  Cloud." 


368  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

"  And  you  say  you  love  him.  You  can't  love  both 
of  us." 

"  But  I  can.  I  do.  I  do  love  both  of  you. — 
Oh,  I  am  straight.  I  shall  be  straight.  I  must 
work  this  out.  I  thought  you  might  help  me.  That 
is  why  I  came  to  you  this  morning.  There  must  be 
some  solution." 

She  looked  at  him  appealingly  as  he  answered,  "  It 
is  one  or  the  other,  Evan  or  me.  I  cannot  imagine 
any  other  solution." 

4  That's  what  he  says.  But  I  can't  bring  myself 
to  it.  He  was  for  coming  straight  to  you.  I  would 
not  permit  him.  He  has  wanted  to  go,  but  I  held 
him  here,  hard  as  it  was  on  both  of  you,  in  order  to 
have  you  together,  to  compare  you  two,  to  weigh 
you  in  my  heart.  And  I  get  nowhere.  I  want  you 
both.  I  can't  give  either  of  you  up." 

"  Unfortunately,  as  you  see,"  Dick  began,  a  slight 
twinkle  in  his  eyes,  "  while  you  may  be  polyandrously 
inclined,  we  stupid  male  men  cannot  reconcile  our 
selves  to  such  a  situation." 

"  Don't  be  cruel,  Dick,"  she  protested. 

"  Forgive  me.  It  was  not  so  meant.  It  was  out 
of  my  own  hurt  —  an  effort  to  bear  it  with  philo 
sophical  complacence." 

"  I  have  told  him  that  he  was  the  only  man  I  had 
ever  met  who  is  as  great  as  my  husband,  and  that 
my  husband  is  greater."  \ 

'  That  was  loyalty  to  me,  yes,  and  loyalty  to  your 
self,"  Dick  explained.  "  You  were  mine  until  I 
ceased  being  the  greatest  man  in  the  world.  He 
then  became  the  greatest  man  in  the  world." 

She  shook  her  head. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  369 

"  Let  me  try  to  solve  it  for  you,"  he  continued. 
"  You  don't  know  your  mind,  your  desire.  You 
can't  decide  between  us  because  you  equally  want  us 
both?" 

"Yes,"  she  whispered.  "  Only,  rather,  differ- 
ently  want  you  both." 

"  Then  the  thing  is  settled,"  he  concluded  shortly. 

"  What  do  you  mean?  " 

"  This,  Paula.  I  lose.  Graham  is  the  winner. 
Don't  you  see.  Here  am  I,  even  with  him,  even 
and  no  more,  while  my  advantage  over  him  is  our 
dozen  years,  together  —  the  dozen  years  of  past 
love,  the  ties  and  bonds  of  heart  and  memory. 
Heavens !  If  all  this  weight  were  thrown  in  the 
balance  on  Evan's  side,  you  wouldn't  hesitate  an  in 
stant  in  your  decision.  It  is  the  first  time  you  have 
ever  been  bowled  over  in  your  life,  and  the  expe 
rience,  coming  so  late,  makes  it  hard  for  you  to 
realize." 

"  But,  Dick,  you  bowled  me  over." 

He  shook  his  head. 

"  I  have  always  liked  to  think  so,  and  sometimes 
I  have  believed  —  but  never  really.  I  never  took 
you  off  your  feet,  not  even  in  the  very  beginning, 
whirlwind  as  the  affair  was.  You  may  have  been 
glamoured.  You  were  never  mad  as  I  was  mad, 
never  swept  as  I  was  swept.  I  loved  you  first  - 

"  And  you  were  a  royal  lover." 

"  I  loved  you  first,  Paula,  and,  though  you  did  re 
spond,  it  was  not  in  the  same  way.  I  never  took  you 
off  your  feet.  It  seems  pretty  clear  that  Evan  has." 

"  I  wish  I  could  be  sure,"  she  mused.  "  I  have 
a  feeling  of  being  bowled  over,  and  yet  I  hesitate. 


370  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

The  two  are  not  compatible.  Perhaps  I  never  shall 
be  bowled  over  by  any  man.  And  you  don't  seem 
to  help  me  in  the  least." 

"  You,  and  you  alone,  can  solve  it,  Paula,"  he  said 
gravely. 

"  But  if  you  would  help,  if  you  would  try  —  oh, 
such  a  little,  to  hold  me,"  she  persisted. 

"  But  I  am  helpless.  My  hands  are  tied.  I  can't 
put  an  arm  to  hold  you.  You  can't  share  two. 
You  have  been  in  his  arms  — "  He  put  up  his  hand 
to  hush  her  protest.  "  Please,  please,  dear,  don't. 
You  have  been  in  his  arms.  You  flutter  like  a  fright 
ened  bird  at  thought  of  my  caressing  you.  Don't 
you  see?  Your  actions  decide  against  me.  You 
have  decided,  though  you  may  not  know  it.  Your 
very  flesh  has  decided.  You  can  bear  his  arms. 
The  thought  of  mine  you  cannot  bear." 

She  shook  her  head  with  slow  resoluteness. 

"  And  still  I  do  not,  cannot,  make  up  my  mind," 
she  persisted. 

"  But  you  must.  The  present  situation  is  intol 
erable.  You  must  decide  quickly,  for  Evan  must 
go.  You  realize  that.  Or  you  must  go.  You 
both  cannot  continue  on  here.  Take  all  the  time  in 
the  world.  Send  Evan  away.  Or,  suppose  you  go 
and  visit  Aunt  Martha  for  a  while.  Being  away 
from  both  of  us  might  aid  you  to  get  somewhere. 
Perhaps  it  will  be  better  to  call  off  the  hunting.  I'll 
go  alone,  and  you  stay  and  talk  it  over  with  Evan. 
Or  come  on  along  and  talk  it  over  with  him  as  you 
ride.  Whichever  way,  I  won't  be  in  till  late.  I 
may  sleep  out  all  night  in  one  of  the  herder's  cabins. 
When  I  come  back,  Evan  must  be  gone.  Whether 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  371 

or  not  you  are  gone  with  him  will  also  have  been  de 
cided." 

"  And  if  I  should  go?  "  she  queried. 

Dick  shrugged  his  shoulders,  and  stood  up,  glanc 
ing  at  his  wrist-watch. 

"  I  have  sent  word  to  Blake  to  come  earlier  this 
morning,"  he  explained,  taking  a  step  toward  the 
door  in  invitation  for  her  to  go. 

At  the  door  she  paused  and  leaned  toward  him. 

"  Kiss  me,  Dick,"  she  said,  and,  afterward: 
"  This  is  not  a  ...  love-touch."  Her  voice  had 
become  suddenly  husky.  "  It's  just  in  case  I  do  de 
cide  to  ...  to  go." 

The  secretary  approached  along  the  hall,  but 
Paula  lingered. 

"  Good  morning,  Mr.  Blake,"  Dick  greeted  him. 
"  Sorry  to  rout  you  out  so  early.  First  of  all,  will 
you  please  telephone  Mr.  Agar  and  Mr.  Pitts.  I 
won't  be  able  to  see  them  this  morning.  Oh,  and 
put  the  rest  off  till  to-morrow,  too.  Make  a  point 
of  getting  Mr.  Hanley.  Tell  him  I  approve  of  his 
plan  for  the  Buckeye  spillway,  and  to  go  right  ahead. 
I  will  see  Mr.  Mendenhall,  though,  and  Mr.  Man- 
son.  Tell  them  nine-thirty." 

"  One  thing,  Dick,"  Paula  said.  "  Remember,  I 
made  him  stay.  It  was  not  his  fault  or  wish.  I 
wouldn't  let  him  go." 

"  You've  bowled  him  over  right  enough,"  Dick 
smiled.  "  I  could  not  reconcile  his  staying  on,  under 
the  circumstances,  with  what  I  knew  of  him.  But 
with  you  not  permitting  him  to  go,  and  he  as  mad  as 
a  man  has  a  right  to  be  where  you  are  concerned,  I 
can  understand.  He's  a  whole  lot  better  than  a 


372  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

good  sort.  They  don't  make  many  like  him.  He 
will  make  you  happy  — " 

She  held  up  her  hand. 

"  I  don't  know  that  I  shall  ever  be  happy  again, 
Red  Cloud.  When  I  see  what  I  have  brought  into 
your  face.  .  .  .  And  I  was  so  happy  and  contented 
all  our  dozen  years.  I  can't  forget  it.  That  is  why 
I  have  been  unable  to  decide.  But  you  are  right. 
The  time  has  come  for  me  to  solve  the  .  .  ."  She 
hesitated  and  could  not  utter  the  word  "  triangle  " 
which  he  saw  forming  on  her  lips.  "  The  situa 
tion,"  her  voice  trailed  away.  "  We'll  all  go  hunt 
ing.  I'll  talk  with  him  as  we  ride,  and  I'll  send  him 
away,  no  matter  what  I  do." 

"  I  shouldn't  be  precipitate,  Paul,"  Dick  ad 
vised.  "  You  know  I  don't  care  a  hang  for  morality 
except  when  it  is  useful.  And  in  this  case  it  is  ex 
ceedingly  useful.  There  may  be  children. —  Please, 
please,"  he  hushed  her.  "  And  in  such  case  even 
old  scandal  is  not  exactly  good  for  them.  Deser 
tion  takes  too  long.  I'll  arrange  to  give  you  the 
real  statutory  grounds,  which  will  save  a  year  in  the 
divorce." 

"  If  I  so  make  up  my  mind,"  she  smiled  wanly. 

He  nodded. 

"  But  I  may  not  make  up  my  mind  that  way.  I 
don't  know  it  myself.  Perhaps  it's  all  a  dream,  and 
soon  I  shall  wake  up,  and  Oh  Dear  will  come  in  and 
tell  me  how  soundly  and  long  I  have  slept." 

She  turned  away  reluctantly,  and  paused  suddenly 
when  she  had  made  half  a  dozen  steps. 

"  Dick,"  she  called.     "  You  have  told  me  your 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  373 

heart,  but  not  what's  in  your  mind.  Don't  do  any 
thing  foolish.  Remember  Denny  Holbrook  —  no 
hunting  accident,  mind." 

He  shook  his  head,  and  twinkled  his  eyes  in 
feigned  amusement,  and  marveled  to  himself  that  her 
intuition  should  have  so  squarely  hit  the  mark. 

"  And  leave  all  this?  "  he  lied,  with  a  gesture  that 
embraced  the  ranch  and  all  its  projects.  "  And  that 
book  on  in-and-in-breeding?  And  my  first  annual 
home  sale  of  stock  just  ripe  to  come  off?  " 

u  It  would  be  preposterous,"  she  agreed  with 
brightening  face.  "  But,  Dick,  in  this  difficulty  of 
making  up  my  mind,  please,  please  know  that- 
She  paused  for  the  phrase,  then  made  a  gesture  in 
mimicry  of  his,  that  included  the  Big  House  and  its 
treasures,  and  said,  "  All  this  does  not  influence  me 
a  particle.  Truly  not." 

"  As  if  I  did  not  know  it,"  he  assured  her.  "  Of 
all  unmercenary  women  — " 

"  Why,  Dick,"  she  interrupted  him,  fired  by  a  new 
thought,  "  if  I  loved  Evan  as  madly  as  you  think, 
you  would  mean  so  little  that  I'd  be  content,  if  it 
were  the  only  way  out,  for  you  to  have  a  hunting  ac 
cident.  But  you  see,  I  don't.  Anyway,  there's  a 
brass  tack  for  you  to  ponder." 

She  made  another  reluctant  step  away,  then  called 
back  in  a  whisper,  her  face  over  her  shoulder : 

"  Red  Cloud,  I'm  dreadfully  sorry.  .  .  .  And 
through  it  all  I'm  so  glad  that  you  do  still  love  me." 

Before  Blake  returned,  Dick  found  time  to  study 
his  face  in  the  glass.  Printed  there  was  the  ex 
pression  that  had  startled  his  company  the  preceding 


374  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

/Evening.  It  had  come  to  stay.  Oh,  well,  was  his 
/  thought,  one  cannot  chew  his  heart  between  his  teeth 
/  without  leaving  some  sign  of  it. 

He  strolled  out  on  the  sleeping  porch  and  looked 
at  Paula's  picture  under  the  barometers.  He  turned 
it  to  the  wall,  and  sat  on  the  bed  and  regarded  the 
blankness  for  a  space.  Then  he  turned  it  back 
again. 

"  Poor  little  kid,"  he  murmured,  "  having  a  hard 
time  of  it  just  waking  up  at  this  late  day." 

But  as  he  continued  to  gaze,  abruptly  there  leaped 
before  his  eyes  the  vision  of  her  in  the  moonlight, 
clinging  to  Graham  and  drawing  his  lips  down  to 
hers. 

Dick  got  up  quickly,  with  a  shake  of  head  to  shake 
the  vision  from  his  eyes. 

By  half  past  nine  his  correspondence  was  finished 
and  his  desk  cleaned  save  for  certain  data  to  be  used 
in  his  talks  with  his  Shorthorn  and  Shire  managers. 
He  was  over  at  the  window  and  waving  a  smiling 
farewell  to  Lute  and  Ernestine  in  the  limousine,  as 
Mendenhall  entered.  And  to  him,  and  to  Manson 
next,  Dick  managed,  in  casual  talk,  to  impress  much 
of  his  bigger  breeding  plans. 

"  We've  got  to  keep  an  eagle  eye  on  the  bull- 
get  of  King  Polo,"  he  told  Manson.  "  There's  all 
the  promise  in  the  world  for  a  greater  than  he  from 
Bleakhouse  Fawn,  or  Alberta  Maid,  or  Moravia's 
Nellie  Signal.  We  missed  it  this  year  so  far,  but 
next  year,  or  the  year  after,  soon  or  late,  King  Polo 
is  going  to  be  responsible  for  a  real  humdinger  of  a 


winner." 


And  as  with  Manson,  with  much  more  talk,  so 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  375 

with  Mendenhall,    Dick  succeeded  in  emphasizing 
the  far  application  of  his  breeding  theories. 

With  their  departure,  he  got  Oh  Joy  on  the  house 
'phone  and  told  him  to  take  Graham  to  the  gun  room 
to  choose  a  rifle  and  any  needed  gear. 

At  eleven  he  did  not  know  that  Paula  had  come 
up  the  secret  stairway  from  the  library  and  was  stand 
ing  behind  the  shelves  of  books  listening.  She  had 
intended  coming  in  but  had  been  deterred  by  the 
sound  of  his  voice.  She  could  hear  him  talking  over 
the  telephone  to  Hanley  about  the  spillway  of  the 
Buckeye  dam. 

"  And  by  the  way,"  Dick's  voice  went  on,  "  you've 
been  over  the  reports  on  the  Big  Miramar?  .  .  . 
Very  good.  Discount  them.  I  disagree  with  them 
flatly.  The  water  is  there.  I  haven't  a  doubt  we'll 
find  a  fairly  shallow  artesian  supply.  Send  up  the 
boring  outfit  at  once  and  start  prospecting.  The 
soil's  ungodly  rich,  and  if  we  don't  make  that  dry 
hole  ten  times  as  valuable  in  the  next  five  years  .  .  ." 

Paula  sighed,  and  turned  back  down  the  spiral  to 
the  library. 

Red  Cloud  the  incorrigible,  always  planting  his  \ 
acorns  —  was  her  thought.     There  he  was,  with  his 
love-world  crashing  around  him,  calmly  considering 
dams  and  well-borings  so  that  he  might,  in  the  years   / 
to  come,  plant  more  acorns. 

Nor  was  Dick  ever  to  know  that  Paula  had  come 
so  near  to  him  with  her  need  and  gone  away. 
Again,  not  aimlessly,  but  to  run  through  for  the  last 
time  the  notes  of  the  scribble  pad  by  his  bed,  he 
was  out  on  his  sleeping  porch.  His  house  was  in 
order.  There  was  nothing  left  but  to  sign  up  the 


376  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

morning's  dictation,  answer  several  telegrams,  then 
would  come  lunch  and  the  hunting  in  the  Sycamore 
hills.  Oh,  he  would  do  it  well.  The  Outlaw  would 
bear  the  blame.  And  he  would  have  an  eye-witness, 
either  Froelig  or  Martinez.  But  not  both  of  them. 
One  pair  of  eyes  would  be  enough  to  satisfy  when 
the  martingale  parted  and  the  mare  reared  and  top 
pled  backward  upon  him  into  the  brush.  And  from 
that  screen  of  brush,  swiftly  linking  accident  to  catas 
trophe,  the  witness  would  hear  the  rifle  go  off. 

Martinez  was  more  emotional  than  the  sculptor 
and  would  therefore  make  a  more  satisfactory  wit 
ness,  Dick  decided.  Him  would  he  maneuver  to 
have  with  him  in  the  narrow  trail  when  the  Out 
law  .should  be  made  the  scapegoat.  Martinez  was 
no  horseman.  All  the  better.  It  would  be  well, 
Dick  judged,  to  make  the  Outlaw  act  up  in  real  devil- 
ishness  for  a  minute  or  two  before  the  culmination. 
It  would  give  verisimilitude.  Also,  it  would  excite 
Martinez's  horse,  and,  therefore,  excite  Martinez  so 
that  he  would  not  see  occurrences  too  clearly. 

He  clenched  his  hands  with  sudden  hurt.  The 
Little  Lady  was  mad,  she  must  be  mad;  on  no  other 
ground  could  he  understand  such  arrant  cruelty,  lis 
tening  to  her  voice  and  Graham's  from  the  open  win 
dows  of  the  music  room  as  they  sang  together  the 
"  Gypsy  Trail." 

Nor  did  he  unclench  his  hands  during  all  the  time 
they  sang.  And  they  sang  the  mad,  reckless  song 
clear  through  to  its  mad  reckless  end.  And  he  con 
tinued  to  stand,  listening  to  her  laugh  herself  merrily 
away  from  Graham  and  on  across  the  house  to  her 
wing,  from  the  porches  of  which  she  continued  to 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  377 

laugh  as  she  teased  and  chided  Oh  Dear  for  fancied 
derelictions. 

From  far  off  came  the  dim  but  unmistakable  trum 
peting  of  Mountain  Lad.  King  Polo  asserted  his 
lordly  self,  and  the  harems  of  mares  and  heifers 
sent  back  their  answering  calls.  Dick  listened  to  all 
the  whinnying  and  nickering  and  bawling  of  sex, 
and  sighed  aloud :  "  Well,  the  land  is  better  for  my 
having  been.  It  is  a  good  thought  to  take  to  bed." 

L— ^ 


CHAPTER  XXXI 

A  RING  of  his  bed  'phone  made  Dick  sit  on  the 
bed  to  take  up  the  receiver.  As  he  listened, 
he  looked  out  across  the  patio  to  Paula's 
porches.  Bonbright  was  explaining  that  it  was  a  call 
from  Chauncey  Bishop  who  was  at  Eldorado  in  a 
machine.  Chauncey  Bishop,  editor  and  owner  of 
the  San  Francisco  Dispatch,  was  sufficiently  im 
portant  a  person,  in  Bonbright's  mind,  as  well  as 
old  friend  of  Dick's,  to  be  connected  directly  to  him. 

"  You  can  get  here  for  lunch,"  Dick  told  the  news 
paper  owner.  "  And,  say,  suppose  you  put  up  for 
the  night.  .  .  .  Never  mind  your  special  writers. 
We're  going  hunting  mountain  lions  this  afternoon, 
and  there's  sure  to  be  a  kill.  Got  them  located. 
.  .  .  Who?  What's  she  write?  .  .  .  What  of  it? 
She  can  stick  around  the  ranch  and  get  half  a  dozen 
columns  out  of  any  of  half  a  dozen  subjects,  while 
the  writer  chap  can  get  the  dope  on  lion-hunting. 
.  .  .  Sure,  sure.  I'll  put  him  on  a  horse  a  child  can 
ride." 

The  more  the  merrier,  especially  newspaper  chaps, 
Dick  grinned  to  himself  —  and  grandfather  Jona 
than  Forrest  would  have  nothing  on  him  when  it 
came  to  pulling  off  a  successful  finish. 

But  how  could  Paula  have  been  so  wantonly  cruel 
as  to  sing  the  "  Gypsy  Trail  "  so  immediately  after- 

378 


THE  LITTLE  LADY  379 

ward?  Dick  asked  himself,  as,  receiver  near  to  ear, 
he  could  distantly  hear  Chauncey  Bishop  persuading 
his  writer  man  to  the  hunting. 

"  All  right  then,  come  a  running,"  Dick  told 
Bishop  in  conclusion.  "  I'm  giving  orders  now  for 
the  horses,  and  you  can  have  that  bay  you  rode  last 


time." 


Scarcely  had  he  hung  up,  when  the  bell  rang  again. 
This  time  it  was  Paula. 

"  Red  Cloud,  dear  Red  Cloud,"  she  said,  "  your 
reasoning  is  all  wrong.  I  think  I  love  you  best. 
I  am  just  about  making  up  my  mind,  and  it's  for  you. 
And  now,  just  to  help  me  to  be  sure,  tell  me  what 
you  told  me  a  little  while  ago  —  you  know- 
love  the  woman,  the  one  woman.  After  a  dozen 
years  of  possession  I  love  her  quite  madly,  oh,  so 
sweetly  madly.'  Say  it  to  me,  Red  Cloud." 

"  I  do  truly  love  the  woman,  the  one  woman," 
Dick  repeated.  "  After  a  dozen  years  of  possession 
I  do  love  her  quite  madly,  oh,  so  sweetly  madly." 

There  was  a  pause  when  he  had  finished,  which, 
waiting,  he  did  not  dare  to  break. 

"  There  is  one  little  thing  I  almost  forgot  to  tell 
you,"  she  said,  very  softly,  very  slowly,  very  clearly. 
"  I  do  love  you.  I  have  never  loved  you  so  much 
as  right  now.  After  our  dozen  years  you've  bowled 
me  over  at  last.  And  I  was  bowled  over  from  the 
beginning,  although  I  did  not  know  it.  I  have  made 
up  my  mind  now,  once  and  for  all." 

She  hung  up  abruptly. 

With  the  thought  that  he  knew  how  a  man  felt 
receiving  a  reprieve  at  the  eleventh  hour,  Dick  sat 
on,  thinking,  forgetful  that  he*  had  not  hooked  the 


380  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

receiver,  until  Bonbright  came  in  from  the  secre 
taries'  room  to  remind  him. 

"  It  was  from  Mr.  Bishop,"  Bonbright  explained. 
"  Sprung  an  axle.  I  took  the  liberty  of  sending  one 
of  our  machines  to  bring  them  in." 

"  And  see  what  our  men  can  do  with  repairing 
theirs,"  Dick  nodded. 

Alone  again,  he  got  up  and  stretched,  walked  ab 
sently  the  length  of  the  room  and  back. 

"  Well,  Martinez,  old  man,"  he  addressed  the 
empty  air,  "  this  afternoon  you'll  be  defrauded  out 
of  as  fine  a  histrionic  stunt  as  you  will  never  know 
you've  missed." 

He  pressed  the  switch  for  Paula's  telephone  and 
rang  her  up. 

Oh  Dear  answered,  and  quickly  brought  her  mis 
tress. 

"  I've  a  little  song  I  want  to  sing  to  you,  Paul," 
he  said,  then  chanted  the  old  negro  '  spiritual ' : 

"  '  Fer  itself,  fer  itself, 
Fer  itself,  fer  itself, 
Every  soul  got  ter  confess 
Fer  itself/ 

"  And  I  want  you  to  tell  me  again,  fer  yourself, 
fer  yourself,  what  you  just  told  me." 

Her  laughter  came  in  a  merry  gurgle  that  de 
lighted  him. 

"  Red  Cloud,  I  do  love  you,"  she  said.  "  My 
mind  is  made  up.  I  shall  never  have  any  man  but 
you  in  all  this  world.  Now  be  good,  and  let  me 
dress.  I'll  have  to  rush  for  lunch  as  it  is." 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  381 

"May  I  come  over?  —  for  a  moment?"  he 
begged. 

"  Not  yet,  eager  one.  In  ten  minutes.  Let  me 
finish  with  Oh  Dear  first.  Then  I'll  be  all  ready 
for  the  hunt.  I'm  putting  on  my  Robin  Hood  out 
fit  —  you  know,  the  greens  and  russets  and  the  long 
feather.  And  I'm  taking  my  30-30.  It's  heavy 
enough  for  mountain  lions." 

"  You've  made  me  very  happy,"  Dick  continued. 

"  And  you're  making  me  late.  Ring  off. —  Red 
Cloud,  I  love  you  more  this  minute  - 

He  heard  her  hang  up,  and  was  surprised,  the 
next  moment,  that  somehow  he  was  reluctant  to  yield 
to  the  happiness  that  he  had  claimed  was  his. 
Rather,  did  it  seem  that  he  could  still  hear  her  voice 
and  Graham's  recklessly  singing  the  "  Gypsy  Trail." 

Had  she  been  playing  with  Graham?  Or  had  she 
been  playing  with  him?  Such  conduct,  for  her,  was 
unprecedented  and  incomprehensible.  As  he  groped 
for  a  solution,  he  saw  her  again  in  the  moonlight, 
clinging  to  Graham  with  upturned  lips,  drawing  Gra 
ham's  lips  down  to  hers. 

Dick  shook  his  head  in  bafflement,  and  glanced  at 
his  watch.  At  any  rate,  in  ten  minutes,  in  less  than 
ten  minutes,  he  would  hold  her  in  his  arms  and  know. 

So  tedious  was  the  brief  space  of  time  that  he 
strolled  slowly  on  the  way,  pausing  to  light  a  ciga 
rette,  throwing  it  away  with  the  first  inhalation, 
pausing  again  to  listen  to  the  busy  click  of  type 
writers  from  the  secretaries'  room.  With  still  two 
minutes  to  spare,  and  knowing  that  one  minute  would 
take  him  to  the  door  without  a  knob,  he  stopped  in 


382  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

the  patio  and  gazed  at  the  wild  canaries  bathing  in 
the  fountain. 

When  they  startled  into  the  air,  a  cloud  of  flutter 
ing  gold  and  crystal  droppings  in  the  sunshine,  Dick 
startled.  The  report  of  the  rifle  had  come  from 
Paula's  wing  above,  and  he  identified  it  as  her  30-30 
as  he  dashed  across  the  patio.  She  beat  me  to  it, 
was  his  next  thought,  and  what  had  been  incompre 
hensible  the  moment  before  was  as  sharply  definite  as 
the  roar  of  her  rifle. 

And  across  the  patio,  up  the  stairs,  through  the 
door  left  wide-flung  behind  him,  continued  to  pulse 
in  his  brain :  She  beat  me  to  It.  She  beat  me  to  it. 

She  lay,  crumpled  and  quivering,  in  hunting  cos 
tume  complete,  save  for  the  pair  of  tiny  bronze  spurs 
held  over  her  in  anguished  impotence  by  the  fright 
ened  maid. 

His  examination  was  quick.  Paula  breathed,  al 
though  she  was  unconscious.  From  front  to  back, 
on  the  left  side,  the  bullet  had  torn  through.  His 
next  spring  was  to  the  telephone,  and  as  he  waited 
the  delay  of  connecting  through  the  house  central 
he  prayed  that  Hennessy  would  be  at  the  stallion 
barn.  A  stable  boy  answered,  and,  while  he  ran 
to  fetch  the  veterinary,  Dick  ordered  Oh  Joy  to 
stay  by  the  switches,  and  to  send  Oh  My  to  him  at 
once. 

From  the  tail  of  his  eye  he  saw  Graham  rush  into 
the  room  and  on  to  Paula. 

"  Hennessy,"  Dick  commanded.  "  Come  on  the 
jump.  Bring  the  needful  for  first  aid.  It's  a  rifle 
shot  through  the  lungs  or  heart  or  both.  Come  right- 
to  Mrs.  Forrest's  rooms.  Now  jump." 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  383 

"  Don't  touch  her,"  he  said  sharply  to  Graham. 
"  It  might  make  it  worse,  start  a  worse  hemorrhage." 

Next  he  was  back  at  Oh  Joy. 

"  Start  Callahan  with  the  racing  car  for  Eldorado. 
Tell  him  he'll  meet  Doctor  Robinson  on  the  way, 
and  that  he  is  to  bring  Doctor  Robinson  back  with 
him  on  the  jump.  Tell  him  to  jump  like  the  devil 
was  after  him.  Tell  him  Mrs.  Forrest  is  hurt  and 
that  if  he  makes  time  he'll  save  her  life." 

Receiver  to  ear,  he  turned  to  look  at  Paula.  Gra 
ham,  bending  over  her  but  not  touching  her,  met  his 
eyes. 

"  Forrest,"  he  began,  "  if  you  have  done  — " 

But  Dick  hushed  him  with  a  warning  glance  di 
rected  toward  Oh  Dear  who  still  held  the  bronze 
spurs  in  speechless  helplessness. 

"  It  can  be  discussed  later,"  Dick  said  shortly,  as 
he  turned  his  mouth  to  the  transmitter. 

u  Doctor  Robinson?  .  .  .  Good.  Mrs.  Forrest 
has  a  rifle-shot  through  lungs  or  heart  or  maybe 
both.  Callahan  is  on  his  way  to  meet  you  in  the  rac 
ing  car.  Keep  coming  as  fast  as  God'll  let  you  till 
you  meet  Callahan.  Good-by." 

Back  to  Paula,  Graham  stepped  aside  as  Dick,  on 
his  knees,  bent  over  her.  His  examination  was 
brief.  He  looked  up  at  Graham  with  a  shake  of  the 
head  and  said: 

"  It's  too  ticklish  to  fool  with." 

He  turned  to  Oh  Dear. 

"  Put  down  those  spurs  and  bring  pillows. — 
Evan,  lend  a  hand  on  the  other  side,  and  lift  gently 
and  steadily. —  Oh  Dear,  shove  that  pillow  under  — 
easy,  easy." 


384  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

He  looked  up  and  saw  Oh  My  standing  silently, 
awaiting  orders. 

u  Get  Mr.  Bonbright  to  relieve  Oh  Joy  at  the 
switches,"  Dick  commanded.  "  Tell  Oh  Joy  to 
stand  near  to  Mr.  Bonbright  to  rush  orders.  Tell 
Oh  Joy  to  have  all  the  house  boys  around  him  to 
rush  the  orders.  As  soon  as  Saunders  comes  back 
with  Mr.  Bishop's  crowd,  tell  Oh  Joy  to  start  him 
out  on  the  jump  to  Eldorado  to  look  for  Callahan 
in  case  Callahan  has  a  smash  up.  Tell  Oh  Joy  to 
get  hold  of  Mr.  Manson,  and  Mr.  Pitts  or  any  two 
of  the  managers  who  have  machines  and  have  them, 
with  their  machines,  waiting  here  at  the  house.  Tell 
Oh  Joy  to  take  care  of  Mr.  Bishop's  crowd  as  usual. 
And  you  come  back  here  where  I  can  call  you." 

Dick  turned  to  Oh  Dear. 

"  Now  tell  me  how  it  happened." 

Oh  Dear  shook  her  head  and  wrung  her  hands. 

"  Where  were  you  when  the  rifle  went  off?  " 

The  Chinese  girl  swallowed  and  pointed  toward 
the  wardrobe  room. 

"  Go  on,  talk,"  Dick  commanded  harshly. 

"  Mrs.  Forrest  tell  me  to  get  spurs.  I  forget  be 
fore.  I  go  quick.  I  hear  gun.  I  come  back  quick. 
I  run." 

She  pointed  to  Paula  to  show  what  she  had  found. 

"  But  the  gun?  "  Dick  asked. 

"  Some  trouble.  Maybe  gun  no  work.  Maybe 
four  minutes,  maybe  five  minutes,  Mrs.  Forrest  try 
make  gun  work." 

"  Was  she  trying  to  make  the  gun  work  when  you 
went  for  the  spurs?  " 

Oh  Dear  nodded. 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  385 

"  Before  that  I  say  maybe  Oh  Joy  can  fix  gun. 
Mrs.  Forrest  say  never  mind.  She  say  you  can  fix. 
She  put  gun  down.  Then  she  try  once  more  fix  gun. 
Then  she  tell  me  get  spurs.  Then  .  .  .  gun  go 
off." 

Hennessy's  arrival  shut  off  further  interrogation. 
His  examination  was  scarcely  less  brief  than  Dick's. 
He  looked  up  with  a  shake  of  the  head. 

"  Nothing  I  can  dare  tackle,  Mr.  Forrest.  The 
hemorrhage  has  eased  of  itself,  though  it  must  be 
gathering  inside.  You've  sent  for  a  doctor?  " 

"Robinson.  I  caught  him  in  his  office. —  He's 
young,  a  good  surgeon,"  Dick  explained  to  Graham. 
"  He's  nervy  and  daring,  and  I'd  trust  him  in  this 
farther  than  some  of  the  old  ones  with  reputations. 
—  What  do  you  think,  Mr.  Hennessy?  What 
chance  has  she?  " 

"  Looks  pretty  bad,  though  I'm  no  judge,  being 
only  a  horse  doctor.  Robinson'll  know.  Nothing 
to  do  but  wait." 

Dick  nodded  and  walked  out  on  Paula's  sleeping 
porch  to  listen  for  the  exhaust  of  the  racing  machine 
Callahan  drove.  He  heard  the  ranch  limousine  ar 
rive  leisurely  and  swiftly  depart.  Graham  came  out 
on  the  porch  to  him. 

"  I  want  to  apologize,  Forrest,"  he  said.  :<  I  was 
rather  off  for  the  moment.  I  found  you  here,  and  I 
thought  you  were  here  when  it  happened.  It  must 
have  been  an  accident.'" 

"  Poor  little  kid,"  Dick  agreed.  "  And  she  so 
prided  herself  on  never  being  careless  with  guns." 

"  I've  looked  at  the  rifle,"  Graham  said,  "  but  I 
couldn't  find  anything  wrong  with  it." 


386  THE  LITTLE  LADY 


I 


"  And  that's  how  it  happened.  Whatever  was 
wrong  got  right.  That's  how  it  went  off." 

And  while  Dick  talked,  building  the  fabric  of  the! 
lie  so  that  even  Graham  should  be  fooled,  to  him-l 
self  he  was  understanding  how  well  Paula  had  played 
the  trick.  That  last  singing  of  the  "  Gypsy  Trail  " 
had  been  her  farewell  to  Graham  and  at  the  same 
time  had  provided  against  any  suspicion  on  his  part 
of  what  she  had  intended  directly  to  do.  It  had 
been  the  same  with  him.  She  had  had  her  farewell 
with  him,  and,  the  last  thing,  over  the  telephone,  had 
assured  him  that  she  would  never  have  any  man  but 
him  in  all  the  world. 

He  walked  away  from  Graham  to  the  far  end  of 
the-porch. 

"  She  had  the  grit,  she  had  the  grit,"  he  muttered 
to  himself  with  quivering  lips.  u  Poor  kid.  She 
couldn't  decide  between  the  two,  and  so  she  solved  it 
v  this  way^'^ 

The  noise  of  the  racing  machine  drew  him  and 
Graham  together,  and  together  they  entered  the 
room  to  wait  for  the  doctor.  Graham  betrayed  un 
rest,  reluctant  to  go,  yet  feeling  that  he  must. 

"  Please  stay  on,  Evan,"  Dick  told  him.  "  She 
liked  you  much,  and  if  she  does  open  her  eyes  she'll 
be  glad  to  see  you." 

Dick  and  Graham  stood  apart  from  Paula  while 
Doctor  Robinson  made  his  examination.  When  he 
arose  with  an  air  of  finality,  Dick  looked  his  ques 
tion.  Robinson  shook  his  head. 

"  Nothing  to  be  done,"  he  said.  "  It  is  a  matter 
of  hours,  maybe  of  minutes."  He  hesitated,  study 
ing  Dick's  face  for  a  moment.  "  I  can  ease  her  off 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE 


387 


if  you  say  the  word.  She  might  possibly  recover 
consciousness  and  suffer  for  a  space." 

Dick  took  a  turn  down  the  room  and  back,  and 
when  he  spoke  it  was  to  Graham. 

u  Why  not  let  her  live  again,  brief  as  the  time 
may  be  ?  The  pain  is  immaterial.  It  will  have  its 
inevitable  quick  anodyne.  It  is  what  I  would  wish, 
what  you  would  wish.  She  loved  life,  every  mo 
ment  of  it.  Why  should  we  deny  her  any  of  the  lit 
tle  left  her?" 

Graham  bent  his  head  in  agreement,  and  Dick 
turned  to  the  doctor. 

"  Perhaps  you  can  stir  her,  stimulate  her,  to  a 
return  of  consciousness.  If  you  can,  do  so.  And 
if  the  pain  proves  too  severe,  then  you  can  ease  her." 

When  her  eyes  fluttered  open,  Dick  nodded  Gra 
ham  up  beside  him.  At  first  bewilderment  was  all 
she  betrayed,  then  her  eyes  focused  first  on  Dick's 
face,  then  on  Graham's,  and,  with  recognition,  her 
lips  parted  in  a  pitiful  smile. 

"  I  ...  I  thought  at  first  that  I  was  dead,"  she 
aid. 

But  quickly  another  thought  was  in  her  mind,  and 
Dick  divined  it  in  her  eyes  as  they  searched  him. 
The  question  was  if  he  knew  it  was  no  accident.  He 
gave  no  sign.  She  had  planned  it  so,  and  she  must 
pass  believing  it  so. 

"I  ...  was  .  .  .  wrong,"  she  said.  She  spoke 
slowly,  faintly,  in  evident  pain,  with  a  pause  for 
strength  of  utterance  between  each  word.  ;'  I  was 
always  so  cocksure  I'd  never  have  an  accident,  and 
look  what  I've  gone  and  done." 


388  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

:t  It's  a  darn  shame,"  Dick  said,  sympathetically. 
'What  was  it?  A  jam?" 

She  nodded,  and  again  her  lips  parted  in  the  piti 
ful  brave  smile  as  she  said  whimsically:  "  Oh, 
Dick,  go  call  the  neighbors  in  and  show  them  what 
little  Paula's  din. 

"How  serious  is  it?"  she  asked.  "  Be  honest, 
Red  Cloud,  you  know  me"  she  added,  after  the 
briefest  of  pauses  in  which  Dick  had  not  replied. 

He  shook  his  head. 

"  How  long?  "  she  queried. 

"  Not  long,"  came  his  answer.  "  You  can  ease 
off  any  time." 

'  You  mean  .  .  .?  "  She  glanced  aside  curiously 
at  the  doctor  and  back  to  Dick,  who  nodded. 

"  It's  only  what  I  should  have  expected  from  you, 
Red  Cloud,"  she  murmured  gratefully.  "  But  is 
Doctor  Robinson  game  for  it?  " 

The  doctor  stepped  around  so  that  she  could  see 
him,  and  nodded. 

'  Thank  you,  doctor.  And  remember,  I  am  to 
say  when." 

"  Is  there  much  pain?  "  Dick  queried. 

Her  eyes  were  wide  and  brave  and  dreadful,  and 
her  lips  quivered  for  the  moment  ere  she  replied, 
"  Not  much,  but  dreadful,  quite  dreadful.  I  won't 
care  to  stand  it  very  long.  I'll  say  when." 

Once  more  the  smile  on  her  lips  announced  a 
whimsey. 

"Life  is  queer,  most  queer,  isn't  it?  And  do 
you  know,  I  want  to  go  out  with  love-songs  in  my 
ears.  You  first,  Evan,  sing  the  '  Gypsy  Trail.' — 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  389 

Why,  I  was  singing  it  with  you  less  than  an  hour 
ago.  Think  of  it!  Do,  Evan,  please." 

Graham  looked  to  Dick  for  permission,  and  Dick 
gave  it  with  his  eyes. 

"  Oh,  and  sing  it  robustly,  gladly,  madly,  just  as 
a  womaning  Gypsy  man  should  sing  it,"  she  urged. 
"  And  stand  back  there,  so,  where  I  can  see  you." 

And  while  Graham  sang  the  whole  song  through 
to  its: 

"  The  heart  of  a  man  to  the  heart  of  a  maid,  light  of  my 

tents  be  fleet, 

Morning  waits  at  the  end  of  the  world  and  the  world  is 
all  at  our  feet," 

Oh  My,  immobile-faced,  a  statue,  stood  in  the  far 
doorway  awaiting  commands.  Oh  Dear,  grief- 
stricken,  stood  at  her  mistress's  head,  no  longer 
wringing  her  hands,  but  holding  them  so  tightly 
clasped  that  the  finger-tips  and  nails  showed  white. 
To  the  rear,  at  Paula's  dressing  table,  Doctor  Rob 
inson  noiselessly  dissolved  in  a  glass  the  anodyne  pel 
lets  and  filled  his  hypodermic. 

When  Graham  had  finished,  Paula  thanked  him 
with  her  eyes,  closed  them,  and  lay  still  for  a  space. 

"  And  now,  Red  Cloud,"  she  said  when  next  she 
opened  them,  "  the  song  of  Ai-kut,  and  of  the  Dew- 
Woman,  the  Lush-Woman.  Stand  where  Evan  did, 
so  that  I  can  see  you  well." 

And  Dick  chanted: 

"  I  am  Ai-kut,  the  first  man  of  the  Nishinam. 
Ai-kut  is  the  short  for  Adam,  and  my  father  and 
my  mother  were  the  coyote  and  the  moon.  And 


390  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

this  is  Yo-to-to-wi,  my  wife.  Yo-to-to-wi  is  the  short 
for  Eve.  She  is  the  first  woman  of  the  Nishinam. 

"  Me,  I  am  Ai-kut.  This  is  my  dew  of  women. 
This  is  my  honey-dew  of  women.  Her  father  and 
her  mother  were  the  Sierra  dawn  and  the  summer 
east  wind  of  the  mountains.  Together  they  con 
spired,  and  from  the  air  and  earth  they  sweated  all 
sweetness  till  in  a  mist  of  their  own  love  the  leaves 
of  the  chaparral  and  the  manzanita  were  dewed  with 
the  honey  dew. 

'  Yo-to-to-wi  is  my  honey-dew  woman.  Hear 
me  !  I  am  Ai-kut !  Yo-to-to-wi  is  my  quail-woman, 
my  deer-woman,  my  lush-woman  of  all  soft  rain  and 
fat  soil.  She  was  born  of  the  thin  starlight  and  the 
brittle  dawn-light,  in  the  morning  of  the  world,  and 
she  is  the  one  woman  of  all  women  to  me." 

Again,  with  closed  eyes,  she  lay  silent  for  a  while. 
Once  she  attempted  to  draw  a  deeper  breath,  which 
caused  her  to  cough  slightly  several  times. 

4  Try  not  to  cough,"  Dick  said. 

They  could  see  her  brows  contract  with  the  effort 
of  will  to  control  the  irritating  tickle  that  might  pre 
cipitate  a  paroxysm. 

"  Oh  Dear,  come  around  where  I  can  see  you," 
she  said,  when  she  opened  her  eyes. 

The  Chinese  girl  obeyed,  moving  blindly,  so  that 
Robinson,  with  a  hand  on  her  arm,  was  compelled  to 
guide  her. 

"  Good-by,  Oh  Dear.  You've  been  very  good 
to  me  always.  And  sometimes,  maybe,  I  have  not 
been  good  to  you.  I  am  sorry.  Remember,  Mr. 
Forrest  will  always  be  your  father  and  your  mother. 
.  .  .  And  all  my  jade  is  yours." 


OF  THE  BIG  HOUSE  391 

She  closed  her  eyes  in  token  that  the  brief  audience 
was  over. 

Again  she  was  vexed  by  the  tickling  cough  that 
threatened  to  grow  more  pronounced. 

"  I  am  ready,  Dick,"  she  said  faintly,  still  with 
closed  eyes.  "  I  want  to  make  my  sleepy,  sleepy 
noise.  Is  the  doctor  ready?  Come  closer.  Hold 
my  hand  like  you  did  before  in  the  little  death." 

She  turned  her  eyes  to  Graham,  and  Dick  did  not 
look,  for  he  knew  love  was  in  that  last  look  of  hers, 
as  he  knew  it  would  be  when  she  looked  into  his  eyes 
at  the  last. 

"  Once,"  she  explained  to  Graham,  "  I  had  to  go 
on  the  table,  and  I  made  Dick  go  with  me  into  the 
anaesthetic  chamber  and  hold  my  hand  until  I  went 
under.  You  remember,  Henley  called  it  the  drunken 
dark,  the  little  death  in  life.  It  was  very  easy." 

In  the  silence  she  continued  her  look,  then  turned 
her  face  and  eyes  back  to  Dick,  who  knelt  close  to 
her,  holding  her  hand. 

With  a  pressure  of  her  fingers  on  his  and  a  beck 
oning  of  her  eyes,  she  drew  his  ear  down  to  her 
lips. 

"  Red  Cloud,"  she  whispered,  "  I  love  you  best. 
And  I  am  proud  I  belonged  to  you  for  such  a  long, 
long  time."  Still  closer  she  drew  him  with  the 
pressure  of  her  fingers.  "  I'm  sorry  there  were  no 
babies,  Red  Cloud." 

With  the  relaxing  of  her  fingers  she  eased  him 
from  her  so  that  she  could  look  from  one  to  the 
other. 

"  Two  bonnie,  bonnie  men.  Good-by,  bonnie 
men.  Good-by,  Red  Cloud." 


392  THE  LITTLE  LADY 

In  the  pause,  they  waited,  while  the  doctor  bared 
her  arm  for  the  needle. 

"  Sleepy,  sleepy/'  she  twittered  in  mimicry  of 
drowsy  birds.  "  I  am  ready,  doctor.  Stretch  the 
skin  tight,  first.  You  know  I  don't  like  to  be  hurt. 
—  Hold  me  tight,  Dick." 

Robinson,  receiving  the  eye  permission  from  Dick, 
easily  and  quickly  thrust  the  needle  through  the 
stretched  skin,  with  steady  hand  sank  the  piston 
home,  and  with  the  ball  of  the  finger  soothingly 
rubbed  the  morphine  into  circulation. 

"  Sleepy,  sleepy,  boo'ful  sleepy,"  she  murmured 
drowsily,  after  a  time. 

Semi-consciously  she  half-turned  on  her  side, 
curved  her  free  arm  on  the  pillow  and  nestled  her 
head  on  it,  and  drew  her  body  up  in  nestling  curves 
in  the  way  Dick  knew  she  loved  to  sleep. 

After  a  long  time,  she  sighed  faintly,  and  began 
so  easily  to  go  that  she  was  gone  before  they  guessed. 
From  without,  the  twittering  of  the  canaries  bathing 
in  the  fountain  penetrated  the  silence  of  the  room, 
and  from  afar  came  the  trumpeting  of  Mountain 
Lad  and  the  silver  whinny  of  the  Fotherington 
Princess. 


THE    END 


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UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA,  BERKELEY 
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